Largest A25-54 Audience in Nearly 7 Months, Fifth Consecutive Week of Averaging Over 1 Million Demo Viewers
Dominates Evening Newscast in Year-Over-Year Growth Across the Board
Week of August 31 Highlights
- Nightly News wins the week in the key A25-54 demo, topping ABC’s World News Tonight
- Nightly News marks its largest A25-54 audience in nearly 7 months (2/16/26) and marks its fifth consecutive week of averaging over 1 million demo viewers
- Nightly News grows the most across the board vs. last year compared to ABC & CBS
- Nightly News is up double-digit %s vs. last year: +24% in total viewers, 41% in A25-54 and +47% in A18-49
- Nightly News delivers its best streak of year-over-year growth on record
- Nightly News marks 31 weeks of across-the-board growth vs. last year
- Nightly News continues to deliver its closest key demo gap vs. ABC in seven years for the current season
- Nightly News is up across-the-board and posts the largest audience growth among A25-54 and A18-49 viewers
Week of August 31 Stats
- Averages 7 million total viewers, topping CBS by +2.965 million (+74%)
- Increases total viewership vs. last year by +24% (+1.365 million)
- Marks closest gap with ABC in 10 weeks
- Narrows total viewer gap vs. ABC by 10% vs. last year and week
- Grows total audience season to date by +309,000
- Averages 1.1 million A25-54 viewers, beating ABC by +1,000 and CBS by +561,000 (+103%)
- Increases A25-54 viewers vs. last year by +321,000 (+41%) and last week by +31,000
- Nightly News’ A25-54 gap vs. ABC is 47% better vs. prior year at this point in the season, marking its closest demo gap vs. the network in 7 years
- Nightly News sees the largest A25-54 growth in viewers vs. last season compared to the competition , +102,000
- Averages 800,000 A18-49 viewers, beating CBS by +408,000 (+104%)
- Increases A18-49 viewers vs. last year by +257,000 (+47%)
- Narrows A18-49 gap vs. ABC by 38% vs. last year, 57% vs. last week
- Nightly News’ A18-49 gap vs. ABC is 30% better vs. prior year at this point in the season
- Nightly News sees the largest A18-49 growth in viewers vs. last season, +90,000
WEEK OF 8/31/2026
| Program | P25-54 | P18-49 | P2+ |
| Imps | Imps | Imps | |
| NBC NIGHTLY NEWS | 1,103 | 800 | 6,988 |
| CBS EVENING NEWS | 542 | 392 | 4,023 |
| ABC WORLD NEWS TONIGHT | 1,102 | 833 | 8,508 |
Source: Nielsen Big Data + Panel, L+SD, Week of 8/31/2026 through Thursday, 9/3/2026. Average audience based on regularly-titled telecasts only.
Note: Nightly News retitled Wednesday (local preemptions) and Thursday. ABC World News Tonight was retitled Thursday.
