2024 Academy Awards: TV audience improves to 19.5M viewers, best in post-pandemic era

LOS ANGELES — Sunday night’s Academy Awards ceremony was the most watched since 2020, drawing 19.5 million viewers, according to early Nielsen ratings figures.

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The live television audience for the 96th version of the Oscars was up from 18.8 million viewers in 2023 and is the third consecutive year that it has spiked upward, The New York Times reported.

This year’s show started an hour early and drew interest because of 2023′s two blockbuster films, “Oppenheimer” and “Barbie.”

“Oppenheimer won seven Academy Awards, including for Best Film, Best Actor (Cillian Murphy), Best Supporting Actor (Robert Downey Jr.) and Best Director (Christopher Nolan). “Barbie” won one statuette, for Best Song -- “What Was I Made For?” -- performed by Billie Eilish and Finneas O’Connell.

The Oscars drew 19.5 million viewers on Sunday, powered, in part, by the double bill of “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer.”https://t.co/yD8uoiFr70
— The New York Times (@nytimes) March 12, 2024

According to Nielsen, Sunday’s telecast had a 3.8 rating among adults ages 18 to 49 between 7 p.m. and 10:29 p.m. EDT, Variety reported. Last year’s broadcast had a 4.0 rating in its final tallies, meaning that the 2024 ceremony was up just shy of a 4% improvement in total viewers but down 5% in the key 18-49 demographic, according to the entertainment news website.

The 2021 telecast, heavily impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, drew 10.4 million viewers, an all-time low, Variety reported. That telecast aired in late April and not in its traditional March slot, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The audience jumped to 16.6 million viewers in 2022, Variety reported.

In February, 16.9 million people watched the Grammy Awards, a 34% increase from 2023, according to the Times. Also in February, Super Bowl LVIII between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers drew 123.7 viewers.

Ratings for the 2023 Tony Awards, traditionally the least-viewed of the “EGOT” quartet, rose to 4.3 viewers, according to the newspaper.

The Golden Globes telecast saw a big jump in viewership with a 9.47 million audience, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Only the Emmy Awards, hampered by the writers and Screen Actors Guild strikes last year, saw a decline.

The Emmys attracted 4.46 million viewers in Nielsen’s final same-day ratings, a 25% drop from the preview low of 5.92 million in 2022, the entertainment news website reported.

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