HD Ratings: MAFS Ties Up Rivals in Knots

The latest season of Married at First Sight Australia is proving a ratings juggernaut for Three, helping the network to dominate much of primetime from Sundays-Wednesdays.

Its popularity and 90-minute running time is carrying viewers in the key 25-54 and 18-49 demographics from 8.30 through to post-10.00 on most of those nights.

On Wednesday, the network swept these slots with MAFS and The Rookie, on Tuesday with MAFS and NCIS, and last Sunday with MAFS and the movie Overboard.

Only on Monday did it stumble, when viewers switched over from The Gulf at 9.00 to the second half of TVNZ 1’s Billy Connolly: It’s Been a Pleasure, which averaged 4.6% of 25-54s and 2.7% of 18-49s.

Whereas NCIS was able to average 2.8% of 25-54s on the back of MAFS, and The Rookie 2.6%, The Gulf could manage only 1.3%.

MAFS is crushing TVNZ 2’s The Bachelor NZ. On Wednesday the latter averaged 2.6% of 25-54s and 2.1% of 18-49s vs the former’s 4.8% and 3.7%.

As a result, Bachelor lead-out Wellington Paranormal averaged only 2.7% of 25-54s and 2.2% of 18-49s — although that was well ahead of TVNZ 1’s The Royals Revealed (2.1% / 1.6%).

TVNZ 1’s 5 Gold Rings also took a hammering opposite MAFS, but its 25-54 and 18-49 averages still outshone The Bachelor NZ’s.

TVNZ 2’s Have You Been Paying Attention? averaged only 2.3% of 25s and 1.9% of 18-49s on Tuesday, beating TVNZ 1’s Border Security but not Lap of Luxury.

TVNZ 1’s Dog Squad double-bill is within a whisker of challenging MAFS on Tuesdays as is Fair Go on Monday, although the gap is wider between its lead-out, The Casketeers, and MAFS.

Despite MAFS’ dominance, TVNZ 1 still won the biggest 25-54 shares Monday-Wednesday but Three was tops with 18-49s on Tuesday and Wednesday nights.