NFL Championship Games Draw Over 50 Million Viewers

Fox Sports says its Sunday evening broadcast of the Detroit Lions at San Francisco 49ers had an average 56,691,000 viewers. The 49ers made a furious comeback in the second half to win 34-31 and advance to The Super Bowl on Sunday, February 11 at 6:30 p.m. in Las Vegas.

Fox says the game is projected to have the biggest audience since the 2012 NFC Championship (57,635,000 viewers) and the fourth-biggest non-Super Bowl telecast in history.

The Lions-49ers game audience peaked with over 58.9 million viewers from 9:15 to 9:30 p.m.

Through three games, from Wildcard Round to Divisional Round to NFC Championship, Fox averaged 44 million viewers, the best playoff audience ever for the network.

On the AFC side, the Kansas City Chiefs upset the Baltimore Ravens, 17-10, in the early Sunday game with over 55 million viewers. The Chiefs return to the Super Bowl for the second straight season and could have Taylor Swift in attendance in Las Vegas.

Here are some stats from the AFC game from CBS:

• The NFL ON CBS reported the most-watched AFC Championship Game ever, averaging 55.473 million viewers in the early window (3:03-6:12 PM, ET). The previous record was 54.850 million viewers for Jets-Steelers in the late window (6:42-9:54 PM, ET) on Jan. 23, 2011.

• Along with its record-setting NFL Divisional Playoff (50.395 million viewers), the NFL ON CBS has delivered an audience of 50+ million viewers in back-to-back weeks.

• The audience for Chiefs-Ravens increased +17% vs. last year’s comparable early window (49ers-Eagles).

• Sunday’s game is the most-watched non-Super Bowl program on CBS in 30 years since the 1994 Winter Olympics in primetime (Feb. 25, 1994).

• The AFC Championship Game peaked with more than 64 million viewers (64.022).

• Paramount+ recorded its most-streamed live event ever and scored double-digit year-over-year growth in households, streaming minutes and average minute audience (AMA) vs. last year’s AFC Championship Game.

The NFL ON CBS led all networks during the postseason averaging 45.607 million viewers, the Network’s best postseason viewership since the NFL returned to CBS in 1998 and up +12% vs. last year. This follows CBS Sports’ most-watched regular season since 1998.

CBS, with Jim Nantz and Tony Romo, will air The Super Bowl in Las Vegas on Sunday, February 11.