Drama, events drive record iPlayer numbers
August 16, 2022
The final series of Peaky Blinders, The Split, and Killing Eve, live events including Glastonbury, the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, and the Eurovision Song Contest, and new drama Sherwood helped bring record numbers of viewers to BBC iPlayer in the second quarter of 2022.
The latest BBC iPlayer data shows:
- Programmes were streamed over 1.6 billion times between April and June, making it iPlayer’s best ever second quarter
- It’s also iPlayer’s best first six months of the year – with programmes streamed 140 million times more than the same period last year
- Live events that brought the nation together on BBC broadcast TV in their millions were also huge on iPlayer in the second quarter of the year – Glastonbury was the period’s best performing boxset with 36 million streams up to the end of June, and 39.4 million to date – and reached a total of 20.6 million people across both the TV broadcast and iPlayer
- One off live events also performed strongly, including the Platinum Party at the Palace (which was streamed 3.1 million times on iPlayer, and saw a peak audience of 13 million people watching live on TV), the FA Cup Final (2.7 million streams, which had a peak TV audience of 8 million), and the Eurovision Song Contest (2.4 million streams, with a peak TV audience of 10.6 million)
- Unmissable final series also helped drive the record viewing – the final episode of Peaky Blinders was the best episode of the quarter, streamed 4 million times, plus there were strong performances from the last series of The Split and Killing Eve.
Other highlights from the quarter include new drama Sherwood, the first episode of which was streamed 2.8 million times, and new comedy Here We Go, whose first episode saw 2. 2 million streams.
The return of Wimbledon also proved hugely popular, across BBC iPlayer and BBC Sport online there were 18 million streams during June, 53.8m streams across the whole tournament, and a total reach of 25.5 million people watching Wimbledon 2022 on BBC TV.
EastEnders continues to dominate as the best performing continuing series – with 83 million streams between April and June.
“I’m delighted with the performance of BBC iPlayer during the second quarter of 2022, with the BBC’s unique and distinctive programme range creating compelling choices for all,” declared Dan McGolpin, director of BBC iPlayer and channels. “It’s fantastic to see our comprehensive Glastonbury coverage coming out on top for viewers with almost 40 million streams and there were other events that also brought the nation together, the unforgettable Platinum Party at the Palace, Liverpool’s nail-biting victory on penalties in the FA Cup Final and Sam Ryder achieving the United Kingdom’s best performance in two decades at Eurovision. Millions of people watched the final series of beloved drama series Peaky Blinders, Killing Eve and The Split on BBC iPlayer and millions watched brand news series Sherwood, Conversations with Friends and the comedy series Here We Go. And quarter three is off to a great start with record audiences for the Women’s Euros and Wimbledon, we’re well on track for iPlayer’s best year ever.”
BBC iPlayer’s top performing episodes per series between April and June 2022 are:
| Rank | Programme | Series | Episode | Streams |
| 1 | Peaky Blinders | Series 6 | Lock and Key | 4,073,000 |
| 2 | The Split | Series 3 | Episode 4 | 3,714,000 |
| 3 | The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee | Platinum Party at the Palace | 3,080,000 | |
| 4 | Glastonbury | 2022 | Glastonbury Channel – Saturday | 2,855,000 |
| 5 | Sherwood | Series 1 | Episode 1 | 2,810,000 |
| 6 | The FA Cup | 2021/22 | FA Cup Channel | 2,704,000 |
| 7 | Eurovision Song Contest | 2022 | Final | 2,422,000 |
| 8 | Killing Eve | Series 4 | Oh Goodie, I’m the Winner | 2,349,000 |
| 9 | Here We Go | Series 1 | Mum’s Birthday Voucher | 2,204,000 |
| 10 | Freeze the Fear with Wim Hof | Series 1 | Episode 1 | 2,146,000 |
April to June’s best performing boxsets are:
| Rank | Programme | Streams |
| 1 | Glastonbury | 35,998,000 |
| 2 | The Split | 35,454,000 |
| 3 | Silent Witness | 20,656,000 |
| 4 | Peaky Blinders | 18,153,000 |
| 5 | MasterChef | 18,011,000 |
| 6 | Killing Eve | 17,856,000 |
| 7 | Wimbledon | 14,442,000 |
| 8 | Snooker: World Championship | 13,922,000 |
| 9 | Conversations with Friends | 13,045,000 |
| 10 | Doctor Who | 12,913,000 |