Super Bowl averages 113 million, 3rd-most watched in history

PHOENIX (AP) -- Sunday’s Super Bowl was the third most-watched television show in history, with an estimated 113 million people watching the Kansas City Chiefs rally to defeat the Philadelphia Eagles, 38-35.

The 2015 game between New England and Seattle on NBC holds the record at 114,442,000 viewers followed by Super Bowl 48 in 2014 on Fox between Seattle and Denver (112,191,000).

As expected, Kansas City and Philadelphia were the highest-rated local markets to view the game, with Kansas City taking the No. 1 spot. Kansas City had a 52.0 rating and an 87 share (meaning 87 percent of households in Kansas City were tuned into the Chiefs’ third Super Bowl appearance in four years). Philadelphia had a 46.3 rating and 77 share.

Fox said Monday that the preliminary numbers include the broadcasts on Fox and Fox Deportes as well as streaming on Fox and the NFL’s digital sites. The figures are via Nielsen’s Fast National data and Adobe Analytics.

Final Nielsen data will be available on Tuesday.

This was Fox’s 10th Super Bowl since it began airing NFL games in 1994 and the second most-watched program in Fox Sports history.

It would also be a slight increase over the 112.3 million average for last year’s Super Bowl. The Los Angeles Rams’ victory over the Cincinnati Bengals was broadcast by NBC and Telemundo and streamed on Peacock and NFL digital sites.

According to Adobe Analytics, the digital feed averaged a Super Bowl-record 7 million streams, an 18% increase over last year (6 million) and more than double Fox’s last Super Bowl in 2020 (3.4 million).

Rihanna’s halftime show averaged 118.7 million viewers, making it the second-most watched in Super Bowl history. Katy Perry’s 2015 performance still holds the top mark at 121 million.

The Spanish-language audience average for the game was 951,000, which set the record for the most-watched Super Bowl game in Spanish-language cable television history. It was also the most watched non-soccer event in Spanish-language cable history.

Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.