Super Bowl XLII attracted a record audience for the Super Bowl in Canada on CTV and RDS, preliminary overnight figures from BBM Nielsen Media Research confirms today*. A combined audience of 5.07 million viewers on CTV and RDS surpassed the previous record of 4.98 million in 2006 on Global (4.281 million) / RDS (702,000).
CTV’s first-ever broadcast of the Super Bowl peaked at 5.83 million viewers at 10:02 p.m. ET, during the thrilling final moments of the NY Giants’ 17-14 upset victory over the New England Patriots. Nearly 11 million viewers (10.7 million) watched some or all of the broadcast.
Super Bowl XLII became the No. 1 show of the year in Canada with an average audience of 4.16 million viewers, up 24% over last year’s broadcast (3.367 million, Global)**. Another 905,000 watched a French-language broadcast on RDS, up 13% compared to 2007 (798,000) on RDS.
Final Super Bowl audience numbers will be available in the coming weeks.
*Since the advent of electronic measurement in Canada
**All audience figures exclude pre- and post-game and are based on preliminary overnight data only
