Wednesday Ratings: More Slippage for the Anemic 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics

Wednesday 8/04/21 Fast Affiliate Ratings

Total Viewers:
NBC: 10.12 million, ABC: 2.35, CBS: 2.13, Fox: 1.19, CW: 625,000

Adults 18-49:
NBC: 2.2 rating/ 6 share, CBS: 0.5/ 4, ABC and Fox: 0.3/ 2, CW: 0.1/ 1

Excluding streaming, night 12 of the Tokyo Summer Olympics on NBC dipped to 10.12 million viewers and a 2.2 rating/16 share in adults 18-49 in primetime. While adding streaming into the mix will certainly help, it will still pale in comparison to the five most recent Summer Olympics. Worth repeating: consider the ratings for these Summer Olympic Games to be a colossal failure in the ratings. Take a look:

Night 12
Total Viewers
2021 – Tokyo: 10.12 million
2016 – Rio: 20.7 million
2012 – London: 29.1 million
2008 – Beijing: 24.8 million
2004 – Athens: 24.3 million
2000 – Sydney: 20.4 million

Adults 18-49 Rating
2021 – Tokyo: 2.2
2016 – Rio: 5.8
2012 – London: 9.4
2008 – Beijing: 8.4
2004 – Athens: 8.7
2000 – Sydney: 7.6

Elsewhere, the only other original telecasts of the evening was CBS’ combination of “Big Brother” (Viewers: #2, 3.48 million; A18-49: #2, 0.8/ 7) and “Love Island” (Viewers: #3, 1.70 million; A18-49: #2, 0.4/ 3) in the Tuesday 8-10 p.m. block. While I think we can agree the more diversified group of houseguests on “Big Brother” is welcome, what is missing this season is any kind of conflict yet.

UPDATED 8/13/2021: What follows are the Live + Seven Day rating results for the night’s network telecasts on Wednesday, August 4:

Source: Nielsen Media Research