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The 2023 ESPYs scored a Wednesday primetime demo win for ABC.
The annual award ceremony celebrating excellence in sports, which aired lived at 8 p.m. ET from the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, drew in 2.34 million total viewers and nabbed a rating of 0.41 among the key demographic among adults ages 18-49 — the highest of the night — according to Nielsen live-plus-same-day figures.
While the ceremony boosted ABC to the highest demo rating of the night among the major broadcasters, its total average viewership of 2.31 for the night came in third place, behind NBC and CBS.
Here’s how primetime broke down across the major broadcast networks:
Fox earned the second highest ratings of the night — scoring an average rating of 0.34 in the demo — while coming in fourth place in terms of total viewership with 1.75 million viewers. The 8 p.m. airing of “MasterChef” brought in a demo rating of 0.39 and drew in 2.10 million total viewers on average while the 9 p.m. airing of “Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars” scored a 0.28 demo rating and brought in 1.38 total viewers.
CBS came in third place in the demo for the night with an average 0.31 rating, while drawing in the highest total viewership of the night with 3.12 million viewers. At 8 p.m. and 9 p.m., reruns of “The Price Is Right” drew in demo scores of 0.38 and 0.35, respectively, and scored total viewerships of 3.80 million and 3.60 million, respectively. A rerun of “CSI: Vegas” closed out the night with a rating of 0.19 and a total viewership of 1.96 million.
NBC took fourth place in the demo with a 0.21 rating and came in second place in terms of total viewers with 2.33 million viewers on average. “LA Fire & Rescue” kicked off the night at 8 p.m. with a demo score of 0.28 and a total viewership of 2.68 while a rerun of “Chicago Fire” scored a 0.17 demo rating and drew in 2.27 million viewers. At 10 p.m. “Chicago P.D.” scored a 0.18 rating and brought in 2.05 million viewers.
The CW came in fifth place both in the demo with an average 0.03 rating and in terms of total viewers with 302,000 viewers. “Nancy Drew” scored a rating of 0.03 and a total viewership of 393,000 while “Riverdale” brought in a rating of 0.04 and drew in 210,000 viewers.
Neither The CW nor Fox air primetime programming at 10 p.m.
In terms of Spanish-language networks, Univision came in first place in ratings with a 0.9 rating in the demo and came in first for total viewers with 2.37 million total average viewers in primetime thanks to telecasts of the 2023 Gold Cup. The first match, which aired from 7 p.m. to 10:30 p.m., drew in a rating of 0.7 in the demo and 1.90 million viewers in primetime while the second match of the night scored a 1.1 rating score and brought in 2.77 million viewers on average.
Telemundo came in second in both ratings in the demo and in total viewership, earning an average 0.2 ratings score and bringing in 842,000 million total viewers. “Top Chef VIP,” which ran from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m., earned a ratings score of 0.2 and drew in an average viewership of 868,000. “Secretos de Sangre” came next at 10 p.m., earning a 0.2 rating and drawing in 698,000 total viewers on average.
