Most-Watched Television Networks: Ranking 2024’s Winners and Losers

The broadcast bounce is real. As 2024 ends, CBS led the pack in total viewers for the year thanks, of course, to Super Bowl LVIII. No surprise, live sports continues to work its magic for the traditional networks, as NBC was also up year vs. year and even took the adults 18-49 crown for 2024 — bolstered by the tremendously successful Paris Olympics. ABC, meanwhile, was virtually flat (OK, down 1%) from 2023, which these days is a big win — and presumably the Alphabet web was helped by airing more NFL Monday Night Football games this fall.

Among the Big 4, only Fox was down by double digits — and that can be explained by the fact that it ran the Super Bowl in 2023, so of course it’s going to be down. In cable, unless you were a news network in a major presidential election year, well, it was another year of dramatic declines.

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Tomorrow, Variety will share the ranker of this year’s most-watched primetime telecasts. But here, we recount which networks were up and (mostly) down in 2024.

WINNERS

CBS, NBC, ABC: Even though the NFL and other sports coverage gets most of the credit for keeping broadcast afloat, that’s not the only story. This has been a solid fall for the linear nets in entertainment fare as well, which boasts breakout fall hits like CBS’ “Matlock,” ABC’s “High Potential” and NBC’s “Happy’s Place.” Broadcast still matters in 2024, whereas cable… well, we’ll get to that in a second.

TELEMUNDO: On the Spanish language side, we have quite a smackdown brewing. Perennial leader Univision is still on top, but Telemundo is coming after the crown. NBCU-owned Telemundo was up a whopping 12% this year — tying CBS for the biggest jump in broadcast. (And if you take out special events, Telemundo actually claims the primetime victory in primetime for the first time in history.)

JUSTICE CENTRAL, AMERICAN CRIMES AND OTHER DIGI-NETS: Perhaps the most interesting trivia of the year comes from the growth of obscure digital networks that mostly exist on over-the-air HD subchannels but also have some satellite, cable and even AVOD carriage. You’ve likely never heard of these networks — and granted, they’re starting from a small base, so their percentage gain can be enormous.

But here’s something to share at your next cocktail parties: Ask your friends what the two fastest-growing TV networks were in 2024. They’ll never get it right. The answer is Justice Central (up 508%) and American Crimes (up 460%).

What the hell are those channels? Justice Central is owned by Byron Allen’s company, airing mostly court reality shows he produces. But this year, the network also added old episodes of the original “Matlock” and “Perry Mason” to the mix — hence the rise. Meanwhile, American Crimes is owned by NBC and took the place of its lifestyle NBC LX channel, airing true crime shows from the NBCU library like “Dateline” and “Lockup.” NBCU did absolutely no press on this quiet rebrand — we bet most staffers at the company don’t even know this channel exists, and who knows where in might land in the upcoming SpinCo spinoff — but it seems to be working for the viewers who find it.

Other digi-nets with strong years include Charge! (up 33%), Dabl (up 38%), Telexitos (up 39%) and TBD TV (up 80%). The secrets to their success vary: Dabl, owned by Paramount but managed by Weigel broadcasting, switched to a comedy format in 2024, airing mostly shows from the early days of UPN (“Girlfriends,” “Moesha,” “Everybody Hates Chris”). Telexitos, owned by NBCU (another one they might want to hold on to?) airs old Spanish TV repeats. Charge!, owned by Sinclair, runs crime dramas like “CSI: Miami.” And TBD, also owned by Sinclair, shifted away from viral videos in 2024 to a mix of comedy repeats like “SNL” and “Key and Peele,” hence the ratings bump.

MOST “NEWS” NETWORKS: This presidential year, the big story was the expanding dominance of Fox News, which was up a tremendous 30% in viewers to make it the fifth most-watched network in 2024, behind entertainment sibling Fox. MSNBC also remained a top 10 network, at No. 7 but up a more modest 4%. Despite its difficulties, CNN could still find solace at rising 20% and landing at No. 15. Also up 31% was Newsmax, although still at No. 38. The one network that bafflingly didn’t get an election bump? Newsnation, which dropped 1% in 2024.

BIG TEN NETWORK: While many of the league-based networks saw declines in 2024, including the NFL Network (down 26%) and NBA TV (down 2%), the Big Ten Network saw a bounce as it became the Bigger Ten. The addition of former Pac 12 teams like USC and UCLA must have had an impact, as Big Ten was up 25%.

LOSERS

SPIN-OFF CHANNELS: Perhaps the only thing tougher than being a major cable network these days is being the offshoot of a major cable network. Those channels, created in the heyday of cable carriage deal mania, are now often the first to be zombified. And indeed, most of these long ago gave up any promise of original fare and now are completely on autopilot with repeats: FXX (down 29%), Nat Geo Wild (down 29%), Cooking Channel (down 31%), American Heroes (down 27%), MTV 2 (down 31%) among them. Perhaps the saddest slump is VH1, an early MTV spinoff that held its own for decades but was down 38% in 2024.

KIDS AND TEEN NETWORKS: This is starting to sound like a broken record, as Gen Z and Gen Alpha just aren’t watching linear TV. They’re getting their Disney and Nickelodeon fix on streaming, optimistically. But as YouTube and TikTok also grab their attention, it was another rough year for everyone in this space.

STARTUPS: Pretty brave to attempt to launch a new network or attempt a big rebrand in the year 2024. So far there isn’t much to show for folks like Dr. Phil’s Merit Street or Scripps News — which was rebranded from Newsy last year. Scripps News won its first News Emmy in September… and then shut down two months later. The channel ceased operations on Nov. 16.

Below are the primetime rankers for broadcast, cable and premium cable networks in 2024, among total viewers (as well as the top 50 list in adults 18-49). Most Nielsen-rated networks can be found here, with the exception of a few channels that are not ad-supported.

[For historical record, here are previous year-end network rankers 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015.]

THE MOST-WATCHED NETWORKS OF 2024 (BY TOTAL VIEWERS)

THE 50 TOP-RATED NETWORKS OF 2024 (BY ADULTS 18-49)

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