Seven’s night in metro and regional markets, although Ten’s Masterchef Australia had a better night than on Monday, enough to pass Nine and claim second  place overall. MCA managed 1.33 million national viewers, ahead of House Rules with 1.29 million for Seven. Nine was left right out except for another reasonable night for the 6 to 7pm news and A Current Affair at 7 pm.

What was worth cheering about was the collapse of the nasty relationship genre. Seven’s Seven Year Switch has been dying on screen week by week, but last night Nine debuted an even grubbier program called Last Resort and viewers turned off in droves. Last Resort could only manage 592, 000 viewers nationally, behind Seven Year Switch in the race to the bottom, which managed 782,000.

In regional areas, Seven News again won with 682,000 viewers, followed by Seven News/Today Tonight with 564,000, Home and Away was next with 502,000, House Rules was 4th with 500,000 and The 5.30pm part of The Chase Australia was 5th with 457,000. 

So will we see Idol back on Australian TV after the US network ABC won a short auction, overcoming a late bid from Fox? Fremantle, Core Media Group and creator Simon Fuller struck an agreement with ABC overnight.  Idol was killed off by Fox in 2016 after 15 seasons and it ran for seven seasons on the Ten Network in Australia from 2003 to November 2009. Singing contract programs are dying here. The Voice is still doing well for Nine this season, but is a shadow of its first and second seasons, The X Factor has been killed off by Seven and both Seven and Nine have had a crack at Australia’s Got Talent, and abandoned it. 

Network channel share:

  1. Seven (27.3%)
  2. Ten (25.0%)
  3. Nine (22.9%)
  4. ABC (17.6%)
  5. SBS (7.2%)

Network main channels:

  1. Seven (19.1%)
  2. Ten (17.5%)
  3. Nine (15.7%)
  4. ABC (11.0%)
  5. SBS ONE (5.1%)

Top 5 digital channels: 

  1. Eleven (3.8%)
  2. ONE (3.7%)
  3. Gem (3.3%)
  4. 7TWO (3.2%)
  5. ABC 2 (3.1%)

Top 10 national programs:

  1. Seven News  — 1.781 million
  2. Seven News/Today Tonight — 1.623 million
  3. Masterchef Australia (Ten) — 1.335 million
  4. Nine/NBN News — 1.333 million
  5. Nine/NBN News  (6.30pm) — 1.322 million
  6. House Rules (Seven) — 1.295 million
  7. Home and Away (Seven) — 1.231 million
  8. A Current Affair (Nine) — 1.164 million
  9. The Chase Australia 5.30pm (Seven) — 1.151million
  10. 7pm ABC News — 1.127 million

Top metro programs:

  1. Seven News — 1.099 million
  2. Seven News/Today Tonight — 1.059 million

Losers: Nine — No Voice, no ratings and The Last Resort got what it deserved.

Metro news and current affairs:

  1. Seven News — 1.099 million
  2. Seven News/Today Tonight — 1.059 million
  3. Nine News — 994,000
  4. Nine News (6.30pm) — 974,000
  5. A Current Affair (Nine) —799,000
  6. 7pm ABC News – 772,000
  7. 7.30 (ABC) — 776,000
  8. The Project 7pm (Ten) — 686,000
  9. The Federal Treasurer’s Speech (ABC) — 639,000
  10. Budget Analysis (ABC) — 525,000

Morning (National)TV:

  1. Sunrise (Seven) – 522,000
  2. Today (Nine) – 455,000
  3. News Breakfast (ABC,  186,000 + 75,000 on News 24) — 261,000
  4. The Morning Show (Seven) — 218,000
  5. Today Extra (Nine) — 184,000
  6. Studio 10 (Ten) — 143,000

Top five pay TV programs:

  1. Wentworth (showcase) — 80,000
  2. AFL: 360 (Fox Footy) – 76,000
  3. NRL: 360 (Fox League) — 66,000
  4. Budget 2017 (Sky News) — 54,000
  5. Demolition Man (A&E) — 50,000