NCAA Tournaments Spark March Madness for Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery in Nielsen's The Gauge

Cable Captures Only Monthly Increase Among Viewing Categories in March, Earns its Largest Share of TV Since October 2025

Disney Gets a Boost from The Oscars' and a Record-Setting Streaming Month, with Paradise,' Grey's Anatomy,' Zootopia 2' and Bluey' Popping

NEW YORK - May 19, 2026 - According to Nielsen's March 2026 reports of The Gauge and Media Distributor Gauge, television viewing trends transitioned from Olympics-fueled highs into more typical March patterns. The return of the NCAA basketball tournaments helped drive increases for cable and multiplatform distributors like Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery, the Oscars and popular streaming titles boosted Disney, and cable news and FOX benefited from another heavy news cycle.

Cable was the only category to record a monthly viewing increase in March, which resulted in its largest share of TV since October 2025 (21.4%, 1.4 pts.). The largest monthly uptick across age demographics came from 18-24 year-old viewers, whose viewing jumped 8%, likely driven by March Madness.

March Madness coverage sparked significant increases for both Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery, who owned the top two largest monthly gains among media distributors this month:

Paramount added 1.1 share points (largest) to finish the month with 8.1% of TV. Paramount's growth was driven almost entirely by CBS viewership, which included NCAA tournament games, top scripted dramas Tracker and Marshals, as well as viewing to 60 Minutes. Additionally, CBS represented seven of the top 10 broadcast telecasts in March.

Warner Bros. Discovery notched the largest viewing bump among distributors in March ( 10% vs. February), thanks to increases on CNN ( 12%) and HBO Max ( 5%), in addition to a boost from NCAA basketball tournament coverage on TBS, TNT and TruTV. WBD finished the month with 6.1% of TV and an additional 0.9 share points.

Cable news viewing also contributed to the category's gains. A heavy news cycle drove the genre up 8% to represent 29% of all cable viewership in March. FOX News Channel registered a 9% bump, anchored by its State of the Union coverage which topped cable telecast rankings. This helped drive a 2% overall increase for FOX, which translated to a 0.6-point gain and 7.2% of TV.

The Oscars dominated the broadcast rankings this month, with ABC's coverage drawing over 17 million viewers. This, combined with a new record for Disney's streaming properties (5.3% of TV), propelled Disney to a 10.5% share of total TV ( 0.6 pts.) to secure second place among all distributors. Disney's diverse mix of streaming content, including Grey's Anatomy, Bluey, Zootopia 2, and Family Guy, represented four of the top 10 streaming titles in March and amassed over 16 billion viewing minutes across the month. The Hulu original series Paradise ranked just outside of the top 10 titles with 3.6 billion minutes.

Time spent streaming declined 7% in March versus February, but the category still represented 47.6% of TV. Additional highlights across the the streaming universe included:

YouTube added a half-point to its share despite viewing volume declining about 3%. It finished with 13.2% of March TV watch-time and reclaimed the top distributor spot once again.

Netflix (8.2% share) topped March streaming titles with its original series Bridgerton, which generated 7.8 billion viewing minutes.

HBO Max owned the month's second most-streamed title with The Pitt clocking 5.7 billion viewing minutes in March. This, in addition to March Madness simulcasts, helped drive a 4% gain and an additional 0.1 share point for WBD's streaming properties.

The Roku Channel climbed back to 3.0% of TV, and notably captured the highest annual viewing increase of any distributor, notching a 27% uptick compared to March 2025.

Following a huge February consisting of the Super Bowl and Winter Olympics, NBCU Versant finished March with 8.4% of TV. The media company is trending positively year-over-year, up 1% and 0.4 share points overall compared to March 2025, with Peacock up 19% year-over-year.

The March 2026 interval spanned five weeks, from 02/23/2026 through 03/29/2026. Nielsen reporting follows the broadcast calendar, with weekly intervals beginning on Monday.

NOTE: The Gauge and Media Distributor Gauge (MDG) do not reflect Nielsen's currency TV ratings that inform advertising sales. The Gauge and MDG reflect total TV viewing, which includes both ad-supported and non-ad-supported viewing. Nielsen made enhancements to its currency ratings for advertising in February 2026, with impact data provided to clients and the industry in advance. Nielsen is working on updates to The Gauge and MDG reports to better reflect and include currency enhancements for the Fall TV season, at which time Nielsen will provide additional back data to clients to assist in the transition.

March '26February '26January '26December '25November '25October '25September 25August 25July 25June 25May '25April '25March '25February 25January '25December '24

About Nielsen

Nielsen is a global leader in audience measurement, data and analytics. Through our understanding of people and their behaviors across all channels and platforms, we empower our clients with independent and actionable intelligence so they can connect and engage with their global audiences-now and into the future. Learn more at www.nielsen.com and connect with us on social media (X, LinkedIn, YouTube, Facebook and Instagram).

Press Contact

Lauren Pabst

lauren.pabst@nielsen.com

LINK:	https://www.nielsen.com/news-center/2026/ncaa-tournaments-spark-march-...
	See more stories from arbitron

North America Stories