- Fifth Most-Watched Monday Night Football Game in ESPN Era and Up 63% Year-Over-Year
- Season-to-Date Monday Night Football Up 6%
ESPN’s Monday Night Football delivered another record audience in Week 6, as the Dallas Cowboys at Los Angles Chargers (October 16, 8:15 p.m. ET) garnered more than 19.7 million viewers (ESPN, ABC, ESPN2, ESPN Deportes and NFL+). The audience of 19,723,000 viewers is ESPN’s fifth most-watched Monday Night Football game (300+ games) and easily the most-watched ESPN MNF Week 6 game, surpassing the Bears-Cardinals in 2006 (14.2 million viewers). The Cowboys-Chargers was up 63% from last year’s week 6 game (Broncos-Chargers).
More on Cowboys-Chargers
- Peak audience: The audience peaked at 21.8 million in the fourth quarter (11 – 11:15 p.m.)
- Most Watched Telecast: Monday Night Football was the most-watched telecast of the night overall and across all key demos
Season-to-Date: Monday Night Football Up 6%, Averaging North of 15 Million Viewers a Game
Season-to-date, Monday Night Football is averaging 15.1 million, up 6% inclusive of all linear games (8 games vs. 7 games), despite the Week 3 presentation of two games vs. last season’s singular game in the same week. Excluding this year’s Week 3, Monday Night Football would be up 14%.
ESPN’s season success is a product of its individual week-to-week success:
- Week 1: 22.6 million viewers, ESPN’s most-watched Monday Night Football game
- Week 2 and 3: More than 21.7 million viewers during each of the two hours of overlapping action (8:15 – 10:15 p.m. ET)
- Week 4: 16.6 million viewers, the most-watched Week 4 MNF game in 14 seasons
- Week 5: 17.4 million viewers, the most-watched Week 5 MNF game in the ESPN era
ESPN’s NFL Studio Shows Delivering Early Viewership Success
ESPN’s Monday Night Football viewership adds to all the successes of ESPN’s NFL studio shows, which was documented last week: ESPN NFL Studio Shows with Early Season Success: ESPN’s Sunday NFL Countdown and NFL Live Drive Overall Audience and Key Demo Viewership Growth; Monday Night Countdown Increases Audience Among Young Viewers – ESPN Press Room U.S.
Historical Monday Night Football games exclude Saturday games.
In Week 3 this season, Monday Night Football had two games, with staggered kick off times on ABC and ESPN (7:15 p.m. and 8:15 p.m.). In 2022 Week 3, Monday Night Football had Cowboys-Giants on ABC and ESPN. In both seasons’ Week 2, Monday Night Football had two games with staggered start times.
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Media Contacts:
Derek Volner: Derek.Volner@ESPN.com
Lily Blum: Lily.Blum@ESPN.com
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