Oscars Ratings Drop Nearly 56%, With 10.4 Million Viewers Tuning In (UPDATED)

The 93rd Academy Awards show was historic for having many firsts: Chloé Zhao is the first woman of color to win Best Director (for Nomadland), Yuh-Jung Youn is the first Korean actor to win an Oscar (for Minari), and Mia Neal and Jamika Wilson are the first Black women to be nominated for, and win, the award for Best Makeup and Hairstyling (for Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom).

But now, it’s also notable for its stunning drop in ratings.

An average of 10.4 million people watched the host-free broadcast on Sunday, according to ABC. That’s a drop of nearly 56%, or a loss of 13.2 million viewers, from 2020 when 23.6 million people watched –which was an all-time ratings low. In the valuable demographic of adults 18-49, the show scored a 2.1 rating, dropping 60.4% from 2020.

Despite the low viewership, the Oscars telecast was still the most-watched awards show in over a year, according to ABC.

A drop in viewership wasn’t unexpected; as the Los Angeles Times predicted ahead of Sunday’s show, “Even without the coronavirus challenge, ratings for the Oscars telecast have done nothing but decline for the simple reason that it is on broadcast television and ratings for everything on broadcast television have done nothing but decline.”

(Notably, such low expectations didn’t stop advertisers from buying up all the ad time planned for the show.)

Ratings have generally been in decline since 2014, when possible future Texas governor Matthew McConaughey, Cate Blanchett, and 12 Years a Slave took home the top honors, although 2019, which saw Green Book beat out box office smashes Black Panther, Bohemian Rhapsody, and A Star Is Born, saw a boost from the previous year, when the Best Picture award went to the one about the love story between a woman and a fish.

But it’s not all bad news about the Oscars: at least this year, the current president isn’t tweeting about them (although the former president has already, of course, shared his thoughts).

This story has been updated to reflect final viewership numbers.