TVNZ: TV ONE dominates news viewing in May

Independent data detailing what news and current affairs programmes people chose to watch in May shows TV ONE won in every category and each programme significantly outrated its counterpart from TV3 or MTS.

The main game is in prime time and that’s where TV ONE had the biggest leads. ONE News had an average of 700-thousand viewers a night in May; 3 News’ average audience was half that size with only 370-thousand watching per night.

Not only did ONE News have almost double the audience of 3 News but Close Up’s audience was double that of Campbell Live’s and Sunday’s was almost double that of 60 Minutes.

ONE News at Midday had five times as many viewers as 3 News at 12. Q+A’s audience was four times the size of The Nation’s. Marae Investigates had three times as many viewers as Native Affairs. Te Karere 4:30pm bulletin had an average audience 11 times the size of MTS’ prime time show Te Kaea.

Fair Go picked up on average an extra 75,000 viewers per episode in May (from April) and maintained a substantial lead over Target. Tonight beat Nightline by an average of 50,000 viewers per night.

BREAKFAST DOMINATION

Breakfast’s average audience was almost four times the size of Firstline.

On average 439,700 people tuned into Breakfast each morning over the last four weeks (reach/cume) and they watched for an average of 45 minutes per morning.

“Average viewing time of 45 minutes in the morning is a really great result,” said TVNZ Head of News and Current Affairs, Anthony Flannery.

“That’s a very long time to be engaged with television in the morning and about the same amount of time people spend listening to radio including commuting time each morning.

“It tells me that Breakfast viewers are enjoying the broad mix of content they’re getting.

“The Breakfast team continues to be very focused on delivering what the viewers want – it continues to be a very popular and successful show.”

In contrast Firstline had less than 200-thousand tuning in across the morning (178,000 reach/cume) and their viewers watched on average for 29 minutes.

AVERAGE TELEVISION NEWS VIEWERSHIP FOR MAY 2011

Source: Nielsen TAM (Measurement: All people 5 years and over – average daily audience nationwide unless reach/cume specified)