Ratings Roundup: NFL Week 1 Down 13% From Record 2025; ESPN Earns Its Best US Open Mens Final on Record

Ratings Roundup is a rundown of recent ratings news and is derived from press releases and reports around the industry. In this week's edition, the NFL's return claims seven of the top eight spots in Nielsen's Top 25 Live Sports Events Telecasts, led by 25.7 million viewers for Cowboys-Giants on NBC; NBC Sports opens with a pair of 25 million-plus audiences for the first time since 2015; ESPN's Monday Night Football opener between the Broncos and Chiefs draws 23.2 million for the most-watched Week 1 game of the network's MNF era; Netflix's first NFL regular-season game in Australia averages 18.5 million U.S. viewers; the US Open men's championship posts ESPN's largest US Open audience on record; Ohio State-Texas gives ABC its top regular-season game in 10 years; and FOX Thursday Night Baseball posts its best regular-season Thursday audience since 2022.

NFL's Week 1 Dominates Nielsen Charts, but Down 13% From Last YearThe NFL averaged 19.5 million viewers across its Week 1 games, down 13% from last year's record 22.3 million, which was set in a week without competing national windows on both CBS and FOX on Sunday afternoon. Week 1 drew 21.5 million two years ago, making the past three seasons the league's three strongest openings of the last decade, a stretch that coincides with Nielsen measurement changes including Big Data, expanded out-of-home and co-viewing methodology, and improved streaming capture.

Nielsen's Top 25 Live Sports Events Telecasts for the week of Sept. 7-13 featured a mix of NFL, college football, US Open tennis, MLB and NASCAR. NBC's coverage of the New York Giants-Dallas Cowboys matchup ranked as the week's most-watched live sports event, delivering 25.7 million viewers on Sunday, Sept. 13. Week 1 of the NFL season took seven of the top eight spots, each topping 10 million viewers: Seahawks-Patriots on NBC at No. 2 with 25.1 million; FOX's regional coverage in the 4:25 p.m. ET window at No. 3 with 20.3 million; CBS's regional coverage in the same window at No. 4 with 18.6 million; 49ers-Rams on Netflix at No. 5 with 18.5 million; CBS's 1 p.m. regional window at No. 6 with 14.1 million; and FOX's 1 p.m. regional window at No. 8 with 10.8 million.

ABC's coverage of Texas-Ohio State ranked No. 7 with 14 million viewers on Saturday, Sept. 12, one of 11 college football games in the ranker. The rest: Oklahoma-Michigan on FOX (No. 9), Alabama-Kentucky on ABC (No. 10), SMU-Florida State on ESPN (No. 11, played Monday, Sept. 7), Missouri-Kansas on FOX (No. 13), Arizona-BYU on FOX (No. 15), Arizona State-Texas A&M on FOX (No. 17), Oregon-Oklahoma State on ESPN (No. 19), Iowa State-Iowa on NBC (No. 20), Tennessee-Georgia Tech on ESPN (No. 22) and Rice-Notre Dame on NBC (No. 23, tie).

The US Open took five spots, led by the Zverev-Shelton men's final on ABC at No. 12, followed by the men's semifinals on ESPN (No. 15), the Rybakina-Sabalenka women's final on ESPN (No. 16), the women's semifinals on ESPN (No. 18) and the Pegula-Navarro and Alcaraz-Shelton window on ESPN (No. 25), which ended at 3:39 a.m. ET. NBC's MLB coverage of Cardinals-Giants placed No. 21, and USA Network's NASCAR Cup Series telecast from World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway tied for No. 23.

NBC Sports Tops 25 Million for Both Opening-Weekend Games for the First Time Since 2015NBC Sports opened the 21st season of Sunday Night Football with a pair of games on NBC and Peacock that each averaged at least 25 million viewers, the first time since 2015 that the NFL Kickoff Game and the SNF opener both cleared that mark. Sunday's Dallas Cowboys-New York Giants matchup averaged 25.7 million viewers, the most-watched NBC Sunday Night Football season opener since 2015, when the same franchises met, based on Nielsen Big Data inclusive of first-party data. The figure is up 4% from last season's SNF opener between the Bills and Ravens.

The Giants' 28-20 win, which ran from 8:25 to 11:29 p.m. ET, peaked at 29 million viewers on NBC and Peacock in the second quarter, from 9 to 9:15 p.m. Last Wednesday's NFL Kickoff Game averaged 25.1 million viewers for Patriots-Seahawks. The 2015 comparison featured Steelers-Patriots on Thursday and Giants-Cowboys on Sunday, both decided by one score. Sunday Night Football has been primetime's No. 1 show for 15 consecutive years.

Broncos-Chiefs Gives ESPN Its Most-Watched Week 1 Game of the Monday Night Football EraESPN's Monday Night Football season opener between the Denver Broncos and Kansas City Chiefs averaged 23.2 million viewers across ESPN, ABC, ESPN2, ESPN Deportes and NFL+, the most-watched Week 1 game of ESPN's Monday Night Football era, which dates to 2006 and covers 36 Week 1 games. The AFC West matchup also ranks as the third-most-watched MNF telecast across the 362 games of that span and the most-watched since 2023, trailing only the 2023 Eagles-Chiefs Super Bowl rematch and the 2023 Christmas night Ravens-49ers game. The audience was up 5% from last season's Week 1 Vikings-Bears matchup, which drew 22.1 million.

Monday Night Countdown averaged 1.9 million viewers across ESPN and NFL Network, up 7% from Week 1 a year ago and the pregame show's largest Week 1 audience since 2010. On ESPN2, the ManningCast drew 705,000 viewers, down 16% from last year's Week 1 edition and the lowest Week 1 figure for the alternate telecast since it launched in 2021. The opener begins ESPN's most expansive NFL season to date, a 29-game slate that includes Super Bowl LXI; additional detail on the network's schedule and game portfolio is available here. ESPN's comparisons are based on Monday Night Football telecasts played on Monday nights only, excluding games played on other nights, and Week 1 consisted of a doubleheader from 2006 thr

LINK:	https://www.sportsvideo.org/2026/09/18/ratings-roundup-nfl-week-1-down...
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