TV ratings: Tell Me a Story Season 1 ends steady [Sept. 29]

A look at the live TV ratings for Tuesday, Sept. 29

Most networks aired the first Presidential Debate on Tuesday, Sept. 29. However, there were a few new episodes of scripted and reality TV shows. It’s time to look at the TV ratings for the night.

The TV ratings were relatively strong, but a lot of that will be to do with the fact that it was the Presidential Debate. While we see politics all the time in the news and on social media, these debates give voters a chance to see how well candidates do under pressure.

However, some non-Election content did air for those who wanted a break from politics. How did everything do?

ABC topped the night with its debate coverage

The majority of viewers watched the first Presidential Debate on ABC. This is likely because it was the only network to run a pre-debate program, 20/20: Trump vs Biden: The Main Event. With the pre-debate coverage pulling in 6.34 million viewers and a 1.2 demo, it made sense for everyone to stick with the network.

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More people tuned into the network for the actual debate. ABC ended up with 10.91 million viewers and a 2.8 demo rating. The next highest in the audience was CBS with 5.28 million, then FOX with 4.36 million, and then NBC with 4.09 million.

NBC was second in the demo during the debate coverage with a 2.2 demo. FOX followed with a 1.3 demo, and then CBS with a 1.2 demo.

TV ratings for the regular programming

Before the debate, NBC debuted Weakest Link with Jane Lynch hosting. The popular game show proved that there are still fans out there, pulling in 6.07 million viewers and 1.3 in the demo. That was the highest demo and total audience in terms of non-debate coverage. It will be interesting to see how the second episode performs next week.

CBS and FOX had new episodes of Love Island and Cosmos: Possible Worlds. Both saw upward ticks in both demo and audience, and by a good amount. CBS saw upward ticks in the 60% range in both figures, while FOX saw a 66% uptick in the demo and 33% uptick in the total audience.

While The CW had reruns of Whose Line Is It Anyway? in the first hour, it aired the Season 1 finale of Tell Me a Story in the second hour. The episode remained steady from the previous episode, which is good to say the series had already aired on CBS All Access. This is bonus programming to deal with the pandemic.

Take a look at the full TV ratings for Tuesday, Sept. 29.

What did you watch last night? What do you think about the live TV ratings? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

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