Television viewership numbers have declined pretty much everywhere you look these days, with the proliferation of streaming and more viewing choices now than ever before. But ESPN is continuing to buck the trend.
After posting positive year-over-year growth in Q1, ESPN has continued the momentum in Q2 with the year now at its halfway point.
According to a network announcement, ESPN is seeing growth across the board. The network as a whole is up 4% year over year and primetime is seeing its best numbers since all the way back in 2014.
Measuring against its own audience, Nielsen reported ESPN has increased its viewership throughout the first half of 2025 from the same point in 2024. ESPN on its own is up 4% year-over-year across the entire day (24 hours of programming) and up 9% when isolating the primetime hours (8-11 p.m. ET). When adding ‘Sports on ABC’ with ESPN’s all-day programming, ESPN has increased its viewership by 1% compared to the first half of 2024.
All three categories are among the highest audiences for ESPN in recent years, including more than a decade in Prime Time:
ESPN & Sports on ABC: Most-watched first half of the year since 2016, with more than 254 billion minutes consumed.
ESPN: Second best average-minute-audience since 2017 at the year’s halfway point, with the primary network averaging 712,000 viewers for every minute across 183 days.
ESPN Prime Time: Best since 2014, with the primary network averaging 1.9 million viewers during the 183 nights.
The major event that is helping ESPN with their overall numbers, and especially in primetime, is the expansion of the College Football Playoff. With the CFP now extending well into January, it provides a major boost given that those are some of the biggest numbers any sporting event will draw all season, at least outside the NFL. The title game drew 22.1 million viewers, and the semifinals, pushed back a week off New Year’s Day, drew an average of 19.2 million viewers.
There was also the massive surprise of the Four Nations hockey tournament, which also drew massive viewership numbers. The USA-Canada game was the most watched non-Olympic hockey game in modern history.
In the second quarter, the main draw for ESPN was the NBA Playoffs. And even though a season-long debate raged over whether or not the league was somehow dying or on life support, the playoffs finished up 5%. That includes a seven-game NBA Finals series between the Oklahoma City Thunder and Indiana Pacers, which, despite low viewership throughout the series, saw its overall length give a boost to ABC.
With more viewership taking place on streaming than ever before and the launch of the ESPN streaming platform coming later this fall, the boost to linear viewership could not have come at a better time for Bristol.