The ABC dominated coverage of the Wentworth byelection on Saturday night and Sunday morning, when Insiders grabbed near record numbers to become a top ten national program. Saturday evening saw 289,000 people watch ABC News’ coverage from 6pm to just after 9pm. The channel’s metro share of 4.9% was higher than the SBS main channel (4.5%) and equalled Ten’s record-low main channel share of 4.9%. 

On Sunday morning 723,000 people watched Insiders on the ABC and ABC News. It topped the 601,000 who watched the Sunday after the five Super Saturday byelections on July 28, but fell short of the 739,000 who tuned in after Malcolm Turnbull was rolled by the Liberal party in August. Insiders was the seventh most watched program on TV yesterday. Sky News’ coverage was far behind — 50,000, which was up on the 41,000 for Super Saturday. Sunday morning didn’t attract much support either — it didn’t make the top 20 Foxtel programs where the cut-off was 45,000.

At night The Block (1.682 million nationally) gave Nine an easy win, helped by 60 Minutes with 1.31 million. Ten, which was beaten into fourth spot by the ABC last week suffered the same fate again last night. Nine won the demos. In regional areas it was The Block with 490,000 on top, followed by 60 Minutes with 431,000, Seven’s 6pm News with 418,000, the 7pm ABC News with 387,000, and 6pm Nine/NBN News with 327,000. 

Network channel share:

  1. Nine (34.1%)
  2. Seven (28.7%)
  3. ABC (17.7%)
  4. Ten (12.2%)
  5. SBS (7.3%)

Network main channels:

  1. Nine (25.5%)
  2. Seven (18.7%)
  3. ABC (12.5%)
  4. Ten (8.8%)
  5. SBS ONE (5.1%)

Top 5 digital channels: 

  1. 7TWO (4.4%)
  2. Gem (3.8%)
  3. 7mate (3.6%)
  4. ABC Kids/Comedy, GO (2.8%)

Top 10 national programs:

  1. The Block (Nine) — 1.682 million
  2. Seven News — 1.325 million
  3. 60 Minutes (Nine) — 1.313 million 
  4. Nine/NBN News — 1.293 million
  5. 7pm ABC News — 1.134 million
  6. All Together Now (Seven) — 963,000
  7. Insiders (ABC, ABC News) — 723,000
  8. Invictus Games (ABC) — 715,000
  9. Sunday Night (Seven) — 699,000
  10. Pine Gap (ABC) — 629,000

Top metro programs:

  1. The Block (Nine) — 1.192 million

Losers: Ten — beaten Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights by ABC.

Metro news and current affairs:

  1. Nine News— 966,000
  2. Seven News —907,000
  3. 60 Minutes (Nine) — 882,000 
  4. 7pm ABC News – 747,000
  5. Sunday Night (Seven) — 456,000
  6. The Sunday Project 7pm (Ten) — 370,000
  7. Ten Eyewitness News — 289,000
  8. The Project 6.30pm (Ten) — 277,000
  9. SBS World News — 136,000

Morning (National) TV:

  1. Insiders (ABC, ABC News) — 723,000
  2. Weekend Sunrise (Seven), Landline (ABC) — 367,000
  3. Weekend Today (Nine) — 302,000
  4. Offsiders (ABC) — 230,000 
  5. Sports Sunday (Nine) — 181,000

Top five pay TV programs:

  1. Supercars Gold Coast  (Fox Sports) — 212,000
  2. Supercars Gold Coast Live (Fox Sports) — 164,000
  3. Supercars Gold Coast  (Fox Sports) — 154,000
  4. Supercars Gold Coast  (Fox Sports) — 135,000
  5. Supercars Gold Coast – Supports  (Fox Sports) — 132,000