| Scoreboard | ABC | FOX | CBS | NBC |
| Adults 18-49: rating/Share | 0.8/3 | 0.8/3 | 0.6/2 | 0.4/1 |
| Total Viewers (million) | 3.094 | 2.808 | 4.360 | 1.976 |
ABC and FOX tied the night for ratings in the 18-49 demo, but CBS led the night in total viewers.
FOX aired a special America's Most Wanted which earned a 0.8 18-49 rating which was down two-tenths from the last AMW special which earned a 1.0 back in February.
ABC's Sunset Boulevard 20/20 special earned a 0.9 18-49 rating.
CBS’s 48 Hours Mystery tied 20/20 with a 0.9 in adults 18-49, but was down overall three-tenths from a 1.2 last week.
On NBC, Escape Routes was flat with last week's 0.3 adults 18-49 rating. The Firm slid a tenth to a 0.3 from the 0.4 its last episode earned.
Broadcast primetime ratings for Saturday, April 21, 2012:
| Time | Net | Show | 18-49 Rating | 18-49 Share | Viewers Live+SD (million) |
| 8:00PM | FOX | America's Most Wanted: World's Most Wanted Special (8-10) | 0.8 | 3 | 3.094 |
| ABC | Shark Tank -R | 0.8 | 3 | 3.066 | |
| CBS | CSI -R | 0.4 | 2 | 3.594 | |
| NBC | Escape Routes | 0.3 | 1 | 1.137 | |
| tvbythenumbers.com | |||||
| 9:00PM | ABC | 20/20 (9-11) | 0.9 | 3 | 3.108 |
| CBS | Hawaii Five-0 -R | 0.6 | 2 | 4.143 | |
| NBC | The Firm | 0.3 | 1 | 1.746 | |
| tvbythenumbers.com | |||||
| 10:00 PM | CBS | 48 Hours Mystery | 0.9 | 3 | 5.342 |
| NBC | Law And Order SVU - R | 0.7 | 2 | 3.051 | |
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Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2012 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
Definitions:
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. More information on ratings is available here.
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.)
Fast National 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 baseball 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.
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. 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.
I know Saturday is a low ratee night but those are ugly ratings.
Not one show had a 1.0 demo?? Yikes!
Why aren’t there Sarurday final ratings?
Sorry, I meant, why isn’t there Saturday final ratings?
There are, we just don’t post them because there isn’t much interest by the time we see them which isn’t until Tuesday.
If you ever needed an explanation of why Fox is going to an all-sports Saturday, these numbers should answer that question. I will say, I think Fox used to get higher numbers with the Cops/AMW combo when they ran on a regular basis. People have gotten out of the habit of watching those shows and it shows in the numbers.
By the way, the total for the 4 networks in the demo is a 2.6/9
So where are the other 26.3 rating points in the demo? I would assume most are watching cable, but a fair number are probably watching things on DVR too. (which is why Fringe goes way up in the +3 numbers)
@Tested, far more people are watching cable, non-English broadcast, and local broadcast (like CW on Saturdays) than on DVRs.
@Robert, you may have to start posting them, since these preliminary numbers will be next to useless for the live sports FOX is doing.
Whoa! Nothing cracked 1.0? Double ouch. Robert and Bill, any predictions on how far the spring bloodbath will go? I know you said that shows usually rebound a bit at the finale (and we totally saw that with Ringer), but how low do they usually go before that?
“@Robert, you may have to start posting them, since these preliminary numbers will be next to useless for the live sports FOX is doing.”
Highly unlikely. Most sports ratings don’t move the dial for us. My guess is that the Fox Saturday numbers will be in the range of the ABC Saturday College football games, and relatively nobody cares about those on our site.
Many high schools had their prom last night, which means busy parents in the 18-49, plus many 18 year olds. So that’s my contribution to Fan Excuse Bingo!
“Whoa! Nothing cracked 1.0? Double ouch. Robert and Bill, any predictions on how far the spring bloodbath will go? I know you said that shows usually rebound a bit at the finale (and we totally saw that with Ringer), but how low do they usually go before that?”
The season ends in 4.5 weeks, but almost no scripted shows air new episodes that last half week.
Expect ratings to drift lower for the next four weeks, as they have in every recent year. This is only surprising to those who haven’t watched the ratings in past years.
And only *some* shows get a noticeable uptick for their season finales, it’s by no means universal.
“Many high schools had their prom last night, which means busy parents in the 18-49, plus many 18 year olds. So that’s my contribution to Fan Excuse Bingo!”
Fan Excuse Bingo innovation! I salute you!
Bill, that’s good to know (about DVR) Thank you.
Any reason you don’t include Univision in the Saturday numbers like you do for the rest of the week? (maybe you don’t get their Saturday numbers?)
I should also clarify, I wasn’t suggesting that most of that 26.3 were watching DVRs. But I could see where about the same number of people watching the big 4 were watching DVRs (2.6) Which still leaves a lot out there going to other sources. (like cable, univision, CW affiliates, PBS?? you name it)
“Any reason you don’t include Univision in the Saturday numbers like you do for the rest of the week? (maybe you don’t get their Saturday numbers?)”
Our sources for ratings on the weekend are more limited and do not provide Univision ratings in a convenient form.
Any Legend of Korra ratings yet? I remember a guy last week posting them in last Saturday’s ratings.
Worthy of noting: This is FOX’s last AMW broadcast ever.
My CBS (Orlando) went to local programing. Pushing a new channel called Retro TV all the old shows, it was awful, so I watched USA reruns.
What a beyond dreadful night.
High school proms? LMAO