ABC’s coverage of the 2023 NBA Finals experienced its lowest viewership in its usual time slot since 2007, surpassing the previous record set the year before.
The Denver Nuggets’ five-game win over the Miami Heat averaged 11.646 million viewers, a 5.5% decrease compared to the 12.381 million average for the Golden State Warriors’ six-game win against the Boston Celtics in the 2022 Finals. The series average includes an alternate presentation of Game 1 on ESPN, titled “Stephen A’s World,” which had an average of 544,000 viewers.
Typically, viewership increases as a series progresses. However, overall viewership for most programming has decreased due to the popularity of streaming platforms.
The 2023 Finals featured two teams that didn’t have the same star power as the Golden State Warriors or the national following of the Boston Celtics.
ABC has been the broadcaster for the NBA Finals since 2003.
Denver’s championship-clinching victory on June 12 had the highest viewership of the series, with an average of 13.084 million viewers. The previous high was Miami’s 111-108 victory in Game 2 on June 4, which attracted 11.91 million viewers.
Aside from the NBA Finals, the only other prime-time program that had over 5 million viewers during that period was NBC’s “America’s Got Talent,” with an average of 5.963 million viewers.
NBC was the most-watched network of the week, averaging 3.79 million viewers, primarily due to its coverage of the U.S. Open golf tournament on Sunday.
ABC placed second with an average of 3.61 million viewers. The most-watched non-NBA Finals program on ABC was a rerun of “Celebrity Family Feud” at 8 p.m. on Thursday, which had an average of 3.342 million viewers.
CBS ranked third with an average of 2.59 million viewers. “60 Minutes” was the network’s most-watched program, attracting 4.343 million viewers.
FOX averaged 1.26 million viewers for its prime-time programming. The most-watched program on FOX was “WWE’s Friday Night Smackdown” with 2.43 million viewers.
The CW had an average of 300,000 viewers for its programming. The most-watched program was a rerun of “Penn & Teller: Fool Us” with 544,000 viewers.
The 20 most-watched prime-time programs included Game 5 of the NBA Finals, various alternative series, and news magazines.
The most-watched cable program was the June 13 edition of “Hannity” on Fox News Channel with an average of 2.867 million viewers. Fox News Channel was also the most-watched cable network.
The cable prime-time top 20 featured political talk shows, sports coverage, and the USA Network’s wrestling show, “WWE Raw.”
Netflix’s most-watched title was “Extraction 2,” which garnered 88.4 million hours of viewership in its first three days.
Univision’s coverage of the Mexico-United States CONCACAF Nations League semifinal was the most-watched Spanish-language program with an average of 2.286 million viewers.
ABC’s “World News Tonight with David Muir” remained the most-watched nightly newscast, followed by “NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt” and the “CBS Evening News with Norah O’Donnell.”
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