Married at First Sight faces Australian Survivor and Australian Idol in a reality TV ratings war
Reality TV fans were spoiled for choice Monday night as the big three commercial networks kicked off the new seasons of Married at first sight (Nine*), Australian survivor (ten) and Australian idol (Seven) – the latter hasn’t been on our screens since 2009.
With the fog of the summer holidays behind us – and big sporting events like the Boxing Day Test and the Australian Open – this is traditionally the time when each network throws in its heavy shows to compete for the big ad bucks. And although all three reality series went head-to-head at 7:30 p.m., they certainly weren’t created equal.
Married at first sight (MAFS) dominated Monday night’s ratings, drawing almost the same number of viewers as idol and survivor combined.
The rebooted Australian Idol, Married at First Sight and Survivor are all going head-to-head this week, and viewers have made their alliances clear.Credit:Seven/Nine/Ten
the MAFS Premiere attracted a total of 1.29 million viewers overnight, including 840,000 in the five major capital cities, 273,000 in regional areas and 177,000 streaming on 9Now.
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the Australian idol reboot – led by judges Kyle Sandilands, Meghan Trainor, Amy Shark and Harry Connick Jr. – took second place with a total overnight viewership of 731,000 (58,000 of them on 7plus). and Australian Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains attracted 610,000 viewers (31,000 of whom tuned in to watch on 10Play — the highest number the streaming platform has seen for a survivor start).
The underground numbers overnight for both MAFS and survivor are quite comparable to what we saw last year, with the former losing 29,000 viewers and the latter gaining 2,000 when they premiered in 2022.
Despite the third-best result, Ten’s big bosses don’t seem too bothered by the overall loss. David Monaghan, senior vice president of content and programming at Paramount Australia and New Zealand (which owns Ten), says he’s “delighted with the results from night one.”
The show is certainly a success compared to Ten’s other major reality franchises, The bachelor, which debuted in early January to a meager total audience of 439,000 and delivered consistently disappointing ratings.
https://www.smh.com.au/culture/tv-and-radio/the-reality-tv-ratings-war-has-begun-who-will-reign-supreme-20230131-p5cgro.html?ref=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_source=rss_culture Married at First Sight faces Australian Survivor and Australian Idol in a reality TV ratings war
