Advanced Television

Prime Video’s TNF coverage sets US viewing records

January 3, 2025

Prime Video’s third exclusive season of Thursday Night Football (TNF) set new all-time highs and once again registered double-digit, year-over-year audience growth.

“Prime Video continues to build TNF into one of the most valuable franchises in media, with best-in-class production quality, AI-powered innovations, interactive advertising offerings, and rising viewership among current and future generations of fans,” the company said in a press release.

Prime Video’s second consecutive season of across-the-board viewership gains were highlighted by best-ever audience figures in the 19-year history of TNF within key adult demographics under the age of 55. TNF on Prime’s 2024 viewership among the P18-34, P18-49, and P25-54 demographics each registered all-time highs, surpassing the full-season averages of all broadcast and cable carriers to present TNF since the package was first introduced in 2006. As the NFL’s regular season draws to a close this weekend, the median age of Prime Video’s TNF audience is nearly seven years younger than those watching the NFL on linear networks, and more than 14 years younger than audiences watching prime-time broadcast television during the autumn 2024 season.

According to Nielsen’s Panel Only measurement, TNF on Prime Video posted an +11 per cent average viewership increase among total viewers over the previous season (13.20 million vs 11.86 million), and a +38 per cent leap over TNF on Prime’s 2022 inaugural season average (9.58 million).  When including Black Friday Football into the NFL on Prime regular season average, the viewership increase over the 2023 season rises to +13 per cent (13.22 million vs 11.71 million). Per Nielsen, the 2024 season of TNF on Prime was watched by 91.10 million unique US viewers, expanding its reach by nearly 20 million since Prime Video’s inaugural 2022 season (71.97 million).

Nielsen’s Big Data + Panel (BD+P) measurement scored TNF’s 2024 full-season average at 14.23 million viewers (P2+ AMA). During the December 5th Packers at Lions TNF game, BD+P registered a franchise-high 18.48 million viewers, with a peak audience of 20.29 million. Within this enhanced methodology, Nielsen combines data points from approximately 45 million households and 75 million devices with their person-level panel of more than 100,000 people to produce a deeper and more complete view of all Nielsen-measured programmes.

“We could not be more proud of our partnership with the NFL, our viewership growth and the innovations we’ve initiated for fans and brands over these first three seasons of TNF on Prime,” commented Jay Marine, Global Head of Sports and Ads, Prime Video. “Our production and tech teams are best-in-class, and with AWS and our outstanding team of data scientists, we’re pioneering the use of AI to advance the presentation of live sports in exciting ways, and we are just getting started.”

The 2024 TNF on Prime season delivered several other notable milestones. Per Nielsen (Panel Only), Prime Video featured considerable gains across all pregame and postgame shows, including TNF Tonight and TNF Nightcap, which grew +10 per cent and +11 per cent, respectively. In addition, Prime Video’s second presentation of Black Friday Football (BFF) attracted an average audience of 13.51 million viewers, marking a +41 per cent leap over the 2023 inaugural BFF game.

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