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‘Game of Thrones’ Finale Sets HBO Record, Surpassing ‘Sopranos’

May 20, 2019  •  Post A Comment

Sunday’s final episode of the HBO hit “Game of Thrones” topped the pay-cable channel’s all-time viewership mark, according to media reports.

The fantasy series attracted 13.6 million viewers to the initial broadcast Sunday, based on preliminary Nielsen figures. That total sets a single-telecast record for HBO, topping the record of 13.4 million set by the season four premiere of “The Sopranos” in 2002.

But that’s just the starting point. Sunday’s “Game of Thrones” finale delivered a whopping 19.3 million total viewers on all HBO platforms Sunday — including HBO GO and HBO Now. That figure topped the previous week’s series high of 18.4 million total viewers.

The numbers will be going up further when delayed viewing is added in. HBO has said this season’s “Game of Thrones” has been averaging 44.2 million viewers per episode when everything is added up.

Last week’s series finale of CBS’s “The Big Bang Theory” delivered 18 million viewers, which compares favorably to the 13.6 million for the initial “Thrones” telecast. But it should be noted that CBS, being a broadcast network, has a much wider reach in comparison with the subscriber base for HBO.

CBS will rebroadcast the final two episodes of “The Big Bang Theory” tonight.

One Comment

  1. The stats here really indicate how strong the Soprano Final Season was rather than how strong the GOT finale was. When the Sopranos ran (1999-2005) there was no cord cutting. The number of subscribers to HBO then was about half of what it is now. Sopranos was the program that actually started what we have today. While the premium cable channels had been producing some of their own programming, The Larry Sanders Show was the one that really was getting attention. People still thought of them as the place to see theater films first, before broadcast. The Sopranos was so good and so different from anything Broadcast TV was delivering, the pay channel industry was forever changed. A comparison between GOT and the Sopranos based on a 200,000 difference is not fair to the Sopranos and its place in history.

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