Former contestant Richie Strahan's return to the small screen has hit a record for Channel Ten, making its debut to a 882,000 strong metro audience last night, with The Bachelor’s viewership up 4% on Sam Wood’s arrival in 2015.
In what Network Ten has said is the "biggest launch" for any series of The Bachelor franchise, the show was the fifth most watched program of the night, according to preliminary overnight OzTam figures.
It was the number one most watched entertainment program of the night, followed by Ten’s Offspring with a viewership of 726,000, which teamed up with The Project for a crossover episode.
According to Ten’s overnight ratings, the show pulled 1.2 million viewers nationally, peaking at 1.65 million. It was also the most watched show in people 25 to 54 and under 55.
Network Ten chief programming officer Beverley McGarvey says Ten is pleased with the audience numbers for the first night.
"Clearly many Australians have welcomed the return of Richie Strahan and the arrival of a new group of bachelorettes in this compelling, funny and charming series. The response on television and on social media has been great. And this is just the start of Richie’s search for love," McGarvey says.
The Bachelor was also a hit on social media with #TheBachelorAU trending on Twitter for several hours, with a 52% share of TV tweets and taking out the number one reality program on Twitter so far in 2016. Check out the top 10 tweets of the night here.
The show topped both Seven and Nine’s programs; Border Security and RBT. Border Security reached 699,000 viewers and RBT reached 570,000.
However, the Seven Network still won the night overall with 26.4% audience share. Network Nine was next on 24.7% and Network Ten followed on 23.4%.
Data © OzTAM Pty Limited 2015. The Data may not be reproduced, published or communicated (electronically or in hard copy) in whole or in part, without the prior written consent of OzTAM. Program performance and ranking information subject to change when not based on final program logs.
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