Due to the nature of live sports programming the ratings for NBC (Sunday Night Football) and Fox (NFL overrun) are approximate and subject to significant revisions in the final numbers. See below for more information on these Fast Affiliate Ratings.
| Scoreboard |  |
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 |
 |
 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Adults 18-49: Rating/Share | 5.6/14 | 3.9/10 | 3.4/8 | 2.4/6 | 0.9/2 |
| Adults 18-34: Rating/Share | 4.8/13 | 3.8/10 | 2.5/7 | 1.6/4 | 1.0/3 |
| Total Viewers (million) | 15.096 | 9.448 | 11.029 | 10.286 | 2.356 |
Of course Sunday Night Football booted NBC to the ratings win on Sunday, but a football overrun lifted a mostly repeat Fox lineup to #2. The Amazing Race finale finished strong, up 19% from its Spring '09 and Fall '08 finales with a 3.7 adults 18-49 rating. ABC's Brothers & Sisters hit a season high 3.7 adults 18-49 rating, up 28% from last week (also its highest rating since 3/1/09).
Fox's average for the night was boosted tremendously by the NFL overrun into primetime (which was Cowboys/Giants in the Eastern and Central time zones). The BCS Selection Show earned a 3.4 rating, and that was enough to hold them at #2 in the average ratings for the night even with an hour and a half of repeats.
Extreme Makeover: Home Edition was flat with last week with a 3.0 adults 18-49 rating. Desperate Housewives was up 9% last week to a 4.8 rating, just slightly above the DH season average of a 4.71 rating.
Cold Case, freed of the Three Rivers albatross, and starting on time, managed a 2.2 rating, up 5% from last week.
NBC’s Sunday Night Football Game 13: Vikings vs. Cardinals delivered a 6.8 adults 18-49 rating from 830-11p, on par with last week’s Game 12 (Steelers vs. Ravens) which posted a 6.6 rating in the Fast Nationals before rising to a 7.6 rating from 8:31-11:50p in the Finals..
| Time | Net | Show | 18-49 Rating | 18-49 Share | Viewers Live+SD (million) |
| 7:00 | FOX | NFL Football | 7.8 | 22 | 20.927 |
| NBC | Football Night In America | 2.3 | 7 | 6.777 | |
| ABC | America's Funniest Home Videos (repeat) | 1.5 | 4 | 6.805 | |
| CBS | 60 Minutes | 1.9 | 5 | 10.699 | |
| 7:30 | FOX | The OT | 4.5 | 12 | 11.104 |
| NBC | Football Night In America | 3.3 | 9 | 8.919 | |
| ABC | America's Funniest Home Videos (repeat) | 2.4 | 7 | 9.583 | |
| CBS | 60 Minutes | 2.2 | 6 | 12.920 | |
| 8:00 | NBC | Football Night In America | 4.7 | 12 | 13.402 |
| CBS | The Amazing Race (finale) | 3.6 | 9 | 12.665 | |
| FOX | BCS Selection Show | 3.4 | 9 | 8.572 | |
| ABC | Extreme Makeover: Home Edition | 2.8 | 7 | 9.565 | |
| 8:30 | NBC | Sunday Night Football: Minnesota v. Arizona | 6.8 | 16 | 18.892 |
| CBS | The Amazing Race (finale) | 3.7 | 9 | 11.980 | |
| ABC | Extreme Makeover: Home Edition | 3.3 | 8 | 11.102 | |
| FOX | The Simpsons (repeat) | 2.6 | 6 | 5.571 | |
| 9:00 | NBC | Sunday Night Football: Minnesota v. Arizona | 7.1 | 16 | 19.315 |
| ABC | Desperate Housewives | 4.8 | 11 | 14.638 | |
| FOX | Family Guy (repeat) | 3.0 | 7 | 6.130 | |
| CBS | Cold Case | 2.4 | 5 | 9.932 | |
| 9:30 | NBC | Sunday Night Football: Minnesota v. Arizona | 7.4 | 17 | 19.701 |
| ABC | Desperate Housewives | 4.9 | 11 | 14.774 | |
| CBS | Cold Case | 2.1 | 5 | 9.499 | |
| FOX | American Dad (repeat) | 2.1 | 5 | 4.382 | |
| 10:00 | NBC | Sunday Night Football: Minnesota v. Arizona | 6.8 | 17 | 17.613 |
| ABC | Brothers & Sisters | 3.9 | 10 | 11.266 | |
| CBS | NCIS: LA (repeat) | 1.6 | 4 | 7.504 | |
| 10:30 | NBC | Sunday Night Football: Minnesota v. Arizona | 6.1 | 16 | 16.149 |
| ABC | Brothers & Sisters | 3.6 | 9 | 10.497 | |
| CBS | NCIS: LA (repeat) | 1.6 | 4 | 7.092 |
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You can see TV ratings from other recent Overnight ratings reports here.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
Definitions:
Fast Affiliate Ratings: These first national ratings, including demographics, are available at approximately 11 AM (ET) the day after telecast, and are released to subscribing customers daily. These data, from the National People Meter sample, are strictly time-period information, based on the normal broadcast network feed, and include all programming on the affiliated stations, sometimes including network programming, sometimes not. The figures may include stations that did not air the entire network feed, as well as local news breaks or cutaways for local coverage or other programming. Fast Affiliate ratings are not as useful for live programs and are likely to differ significantly from the final results, because the data reflect normal broadcast feed patterns. For example, with a World Series game, Fast Affiliate Ratings would include whatever aired from 8-11PM on affiliates in the Pacific Time Zone, following the live football game, but not game coverage that begins at 5PM PT. The same would be true of Presidential debates as well as live award shows and breaking news reports.
Rating: Estimated percentage of the universe of TV households (or other specified group) tuned to a program in the average minute. Ratings are expressed as a percent.
Share (of Audience): The percent of households (or persons) using television who are tuned to a specific program, station or network in a specific area at a specific time. (See also, Rating, which represents tuning or viewing as a percent of the entire population being measured.)
Time Shifted Viewing – Program ratings for national sources are produced in three streams of data – Live, Live+Same Day (Live+SD) and Live+7 Day. Time shifted figures account for incremental viewing that takes place with DVRs which are currently in approximately 24.4% of all U.S. TV households. Live+Same Day (Live+SD) include viewing during the same broadcast day as the original telecast, with a cut-off of 3:00AM local time when meters transmit daily viewing to Nielsen for processing. Live+7 Day ratings include incremental viewing that takes place during the 7 days following a telecast.
For more information see Numbers 101 and Numbers 102.
OMG I wanna see if Desperate Housewives did a little better with the “HUGE PLANE” thing
With B&S hitting 3.7, DH figures should be good!
Wow with Brothers & Sisters.
WHOA at Desperate Housewives!!!!!!!!! Really great figures! Season high when final numbers come up??
Ohhhhhh
I thought DH would reach 5.0 at least
Good job The Amazing Race up against some tough competition. It still has legs after 8 years. Nice to see that it now routinely beats ABC Extreme Makeover Home Edition. Has there been any annoucement about another season starting in February?
I believe it’s in March, AZTop. Pretty awesome for a show that was nearly cancelled after its 4th season.
WOW for B&S !!! That’s an outstanding weekly gain. ABC won’t move it now, it’s gold for them.
And DH gained around 2M viewers compared to last week ? Way to go.
I’m willing to bet that it will tick up to a 5.0 in the finals, too.
the half hour numbers for Funniest Videos are insane.. almost a full point.
I would be interested to see what Ugly Betty could do in B&S’s slot, though.
Im glad B&S had a season high, such a good show, would be sad if that was ever moved, or cancelled.
@ cool, it’s true about AFHV I was thinking about that too, almost 3 million viewers up in half hour
The problem with the Desperate Housewives (and I suspect Brothers & Sisters) bump is that its an artificial one because they can’t have a plane crash every week.
Fox did very well for mostly repeats. Counting out the 7pm hour (football overrun) it averaged a 3 in the demo. That’s pretty impressive.
maybe next season it could be a “REAL PLANE”, that would help LOL
Its also somewhat sad that Family Guy and The Simpsons for that matter repeat better than the majority of the NBC line-up does in original airings.
This season of The Amazing Race was the absolute best in years. It’s great to see it perform well.
I guess Cold Case did ok again too. Better than it was doing a few weeks ago. It’s not “new season” ok, but maybe just “not get pulled from the schedule” ok.
Was this the plane crash show for Desperate Housewives? That seems like reaching for storylines. Must be out of material. How does Brothers & Sisters manage to do well, it’s just OTT, overdramtic fluff since S2.
Almost everyone got the cowboys game….here is the % tv coverage breakout for the 4:00 games:
Dal-NYG 93%
Sea-SF 6%
No game 1% 1
i thought Dh plane crash was VERY low budget! LOL I mean i think i could have ran fast then it hit the ground and skidded LOL
LOOK at amazing race pulling survivor numbers!!!Glad its finally getting the ratings it should have gotten many years ago!
That’s great for “Brothers & Sisters”, but did anyone notice how many viewers tuned out the second half? It must be have been disappointing to a lot viewers. Desperate Housewives gained a lot.