The Glenn Dyer breakdown: Seven’s night, easily, as Ten spun its wheels (again) and Nine lost ground as it switched to a semi-summer mode. Beauty and the Geek Australia (BATFG) was the most-watched program with more than 1.23 million metro viewers. Some of it looked appalling, but, hey, I’m not in the demos that matter. BATG saw a big jump last week and it continued last night. It added more than 300,000 last week with Big Brother still on Nine. BB vanished on Wednesday and another 260,000 viewers jumped to BATG.

Seven was also dominant in regional markets, again. Overall, a weak night. Brynne: My Bedazzled Life faded to black with 910,000 viewers in metro markets and that final flourish can be put down to the ending of BB.

ABC1’s Redfern Now slid to 663,000 metro viewers, but still easily topped the weak offerings on Nine (CSI) and Ten (Law and Order: SVU).

Tonight: Test cricket on Nine over the rest of today and the weekend. Better Homes and Gardens on Seven. New Tricks on ABC1. Movies on Nine. The Living Room on Ten.

Saturday: Nothing much at all on the commercial channels, Doc Martin repeat and Kingdom on ABC1. SBS ONE has the second part of Blackout at 8.30pm and The Red Riding Trilogy: 1974 at 9.30pm. Watch PBS News at 4.30pm on SBS ONE and wait until the last 15 minutes for the discussion of the election with Mark Shields and David Brooks. You will learn a lot. They are pretty hard headed.

Sunday: Sunday Night on Seven at 6.30pm, 60 Minutes on Nine at 7.30pm (compare and contrast both programs) after Hamish & Andy’s Caravan of Courage: Australia v New Zealand. ABC1 has the first part of the much talked about Devil’s Dust. Watch it and weep. Ten has Modern Family and double Homeland episodes from 8.30pm.

The Metro Winners:

  1. Beauty and the Geek Australia (Seven, 8pm) — 1.284 million.
  2. Seven News (6pm) — 1.113 million.
  3. Nine News (6pm) — 1.082 million.

The Losers: Viewers of the Nine Network deserved better than what they got last night with a couple of weeks of official ratings left to go. The Getaway best bits program at 7.30pm had 618,000 metro. The first episode of CSI at 8.30pm, 494,000 metro. Faded old warhorses trotted out to fill the holes in a weak schedule that has been bled of ideas by a network that should have been listed, but ended up being restructured because of unpayable debts. It’s showing up in the schedule and viewers have every right to be upset. Ten was again weak with its programs averaging no more than 562,000 metro viewers at 7pm. But then we know the network is struggling.Metro News & CA: While Seven News won Sydney by 37,000 (a big margin for Seven at the moment), it lost Melbourne by another crushing margin, of 150,000, 229,000 to 379,000. Today Tonight won nationally and in Sydney, Adelaide and Perth, but A Current Affair won Brisbane and won Melbourne, 291,000 to 212,000 viewers.

  1. Seven News (6pm) — 1.113 million.
  2. Nine News (6pm) — 1.082 million.
  3. Today Tonight (Seven, 6.30pm) — 970,000.
  4. ABC1 News (7pm) — 930,000.
  5. A Current Affair (Nine, 6.30pm) — 911,000.
  6. 7.30 (ABC1, 7.30pm) — 780,000.
  7. Ten News (5pm) — 545,000.
  8. The Project (Ten, 6.30pm) — 535,000.
  9. The Project (Ten, 6pm) — 364,000.
  10. Ten Late News (Ten, 10.30pm) –202,000.
  11. Lateline (ABC1, 10.30pm) –200,000.
  12. The Business (ABC1, 11.05pm, repeat) — 149,000.
  13. SBS News (6.30pm) — 141,000.
  14. SBS Late News (10.30pm) — 109,000.
  15. The Drum (News 24, 6pm) — 38,000.

In the morning: Nine’s Mornings had its second win over Seven’s The Morning Show in as many weeks.

  1. Sunrise (Seven, 7am ) — 370,000.
  2. Today (Nine, 7am) — 345,000.
  3. Mornings (Nine, 9am) — 126,000.
  4. The Morning Show (Seven, 9am) — 118,000.
  5. News Breakfast (ABC1, 7am) — 49,000 + 40,000 on News 24.
  6. Breakfast (Ten, 7am) — 47,000.

Metro FTA: Seven (three channels) won with a share of 32.5%, from Nine (three) on 24.0%, Ten (three) ended on 19.4%, the ABC (four) was on 18.4% and SBS (two) was on 5.7%. Seven now leads the week with 30.1% from Nine on 27.8%, Ten is on 18.6%, the ABC is on 18.2% and SBS was on 5.3%. main Channels: Seven won with a share of 25.3%, from Nine on 16.6%, ABC1 was on 13.8%, Ten was on 12.4% and SBS ONE ended on 5.1%. Seven leads the week with 202.6% from Nine on 20.6%, ABC1 was on 13.4% and Ten was on 12.7%.

Metro Digital: GO and Eleven tied the night with 4.4% each, with 7mate on 4.2%. Meanwhile, 7TWO was on 3.1%, Gem was on 3.0%, ONE ended on 2.5%, ABC2 was on 2.3%, ABC3 ended on 1.3%, News 24 was on 1.0% and SBS TWO was on 0.6%. The 10 digital channels FTA share last night was 26.8%. GO is back in the lead in the week with 4.0%, from 7TWO on 3.8% and 7mate on 3.7%.

Metro including Pay TV: Seven (three channels) won with a share of 26.5%, from Nine (three) on 19.5%, Ten (three) ended on 15.8%, the ABC (four) was on 15.0% and SBS (two) was on 4.7%. The 15 FTA channels had a total share last night of 83.8% which is lower than it has been Sunday to Thursday for some weeks. The 10 digital channels total was 21.7%, the five main channels’ share totalled 62.1%. The 200 plus channels on Foxtel saw the Pay TV share boosted to 16.2%, which explains the fall in the FTA share.

Metro Markets: A clean sweep for Seven (overall and the main channels). In Sydney the ABC/ABC1 were third with Ten fourth and Nine second. In Brisbane and Adelaide, it was Nine second and Ten third. In Brisbane, Ten was third overall and ABC1 bumped to fourth in the main channels. In Perth the main channels read: Seven, from ABC1 and Ten, with Nine fourth. In the digitals a very mixed night with Eleven winning Sydney and Perth, GO winning Melbourne and sharing Brisbane with 7TWO, while 7mate won Adelaide. In the week so far, Seven leads Nine and the ABC in Sydney and leads Nine and Ten in Adelaide and Perth. Nine still leads Seven and Ten in Melbourne and Brisbane.

*Some figures, including top ten national programs, regional and pay TV, are missing from today’s ratings. Apologies.

(All shares on the basis of combined overnight 6pm to midnight All People)

Source: Oztam, TV Networks data