This is the second update of my ratings article. This one takes into account that in the original reported preliminary ratings, the last six minutes of the Friends finale (from 10:00 to 10:06) were counted as part of ER's average instead of Friends' average. Obviously, adjusting to fix this gives Friends a boost, since the last six minutes were at the peak of its audience size, while significantly decreasing ER's numbers. Friends now has an estimate of 52.25 million viewers, but keep in mind that this is still a preliminary estimate, not the final numbers, which should be higher. In addition, NBC still hasn't released their estimate of the actual audience.
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FRIENDS CONCLUDES ONE OF THE MOST SUCCESSFUL SITCOM RUNS OF ALL TIME WITH INCREDIBLY HIGH VIEWERSHIP, MARKING THE MOST-WATCHED ENTERTAINMENT PROGRAM IN NEARLY SIX YEARS WITH A PRELIMINARY ESTIMATE OF 52.25 MILLION VIEWERS THAT WILL RISE WITH THE FINAL RELEASE, AS NBC'S DATA COULD REVEAL THAT MORE THAN 80 MILLION VIEWERS SAW THE SERIES FINALE
May 6, 2004: Fast National Ratings from Nielsen Media Research
It's all over. After an amazing ten-year run during which it possessed the ratings power to take over the anchor position for NBC's Thursday night "Must-See TV" lineup after just one season, then never left the top five, Friends concluded on Thursday night, May 6, 2004, with a one-hour retrospective clip show followed by a one-hour-and-six-minute series finale.
After weeks of aggressive promoting by NBC and an almost unprecedented media blitz, viewers turned out en masse to bid Friends farewell. Nielsen Media Research's fast national ratings have the episode with an incredible 52.25 million viewers. However, this number will rise when the final numbers are released later Friday afternoon. It is important to note that for major television events like the Friends finale, flaws in the Nielsen ratings system lead it to predict figures significantly lower than the actual number of viewers who likely saw the show. Nielsen only measures in-home viewing, and thus completely ignores viewers who watched at someone else's home, on college campuses and in college dormitories, at restaurants and bars, at hotels and motels, and anywhere else where numerous Friends finale viewing parties took place. NBC will release a more accurate estimate of the episode's actual number of viewers based on survey research, and this amount may be in excess of 80 million viewers.
Airing from 9:00 to 10:06, the Friends finale, entitled "The Last One," was the second-most-watched program of the season behind the Super Bowl, pulling an amazingly dominant Planet Dan estimate (based on comparing the preliminary timeslot numbers with retention rates from the overnight numbers) of a 29.9 rating and 43 share and a preliminary estimate of 52.25 million viewers. Discounting the Super Bowl, it ranks as the most-watched television program in nearly six years. For now, the numbers leave it as the second-most-watched Friends episode of all time behind The One After the Super Bowl, which had 52.9 million viewers in 1996, but Nielsen's final release could push the series finale over the top. The clip show airing from 8:00 to 9:00, "The One Before the Last One � Ten Years of Friends," also dominated, pulling a 21.5 rating and 34 share with a preliminary estimate of 35.9 million viewers. The success carried over to The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, which took place with the cast of Friends on the set of Central Perk, pulling a preliminary estimate of 12.6 million viewers from 11:42 to 12:45. Meanwhile, ER finished off primetime for NBC after the Friends finale from 10:06 to 11:07 with a Planet Dan estimate of a 17.6 rating and 27 share and a preliminary estimate of 28.4 million viewers, taking third place for the night behind the two Friends offerings. CBS occupied the next three spots, with CSI: Crime Scene Investigation at a fourth-place 12.8/19, Survivor: All-Stars in fifth with a 10.8/17, and Without a Trace taking sixth with a 10.5/16. Overall, NBC finished its most successful night of primetime this season with a 23.6/36 average, more than doubling an 11.4/17 average for CBS.
The Friends finale ranks as the fourth-most-watched series finale in television history. In 1983, the final episode of M*A*S*H pulled an average of 105.4 million viewers, easily the highest number in television history. Due to the proliferation of cable that has greatly eroded network television viewership over the past twenty years, this record will never be broken. Back then, viewers had three channels from which to choose; now, most have close to one hundred. The final episode of Cheers had 80.3 million viewers in 1993, while the 1998 series finale of Seinfeld came away with 76.2 million. Friends will likely end up in fourth place overall for the 2003-2004 television season behind CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and both nights of American Idol. Of course, Friends' average was severely diluted by the number of reruns NBC was forced to air because of the lower number of new episodes agreed on for the show's final season. Averaging only new episodes, Friends would easily take second place. To view the complete ratings charts for all ten seasons of Friends, use the links in the chart near the top of the page. This article will be updated when the final numbers are released and when NBC releases its more accurate viewership estimates.
This may be the end of Friends, but it is not the end of Planet Dan's ratings coverage. Stay tuned for Joey Ratings Presented by Dan, coming this September!