Ratings Watch: Grammy Awards, ‘Walking Dead’ Lead the Week

Michael Schneider February 28, 2016, 4:49 pm

Music’s biggest night held steady in its move to Monday this year.

The 58th annual Grammy Awards averaged 26.3 million viewers this year, when three days of time-shifted viewing is included. That’s down slightly from 26.7 million last year, when it aired on a Sunday.

This year’s show ran on Monday, Feb. 15, and was also the first year that CBS offered the Grammys live to stations on the west coast.

The show was moved to Monday because recording academy officials and CBS wanted to avoid Valentine’s Day, and also thought Feb. 15 made sense because it was a holiday (President’s Day). Of course, the real reason went unsaid: AMC’s juggernaut The Walking Dead returned on Feb. 14, and the Grammys’ viewership would have likely been hurt.

Indeed, although the Grammys won the week ending Feb. 21 among total viewers, The Walking Dead was tops with adults 18-49.

Meanwhile, even though it was a holiday, Monday was also good for The X-Files and The Bachelor, both of which also landed in the top 25. (Granted, The Bachelor was down from last week’s 9.8 million due to the competition).

Here are the top 25 shows (including Live+3 DVR and VOD data) among total viewers and adults 18-49 for the week of February 15 through 21, 2016.

Total viewers chart:

RANK	SHOW & NETWORK	LIVE+3 DAYS DVR/VOD	WATCHED LIVE/ SAME DAY
1	58th Grammy Awards CBS	26.3	25.0
2	NCIS CBS	20.0	17.3
3	The Big Bang Theory CBS	19.5	15.2
4	The Walking Dead AMC	18.4	13.5
5	NCIS: New Orleans CBS	15.7	13.4
6	Blue Bloods CBS	14.2	10.7
7	Madam Secretary CBS	12.3	10.7
8	Hawaii Five-O CBS	11.3	8.9
9	60 Minutes CBS	11.0	10.7
10	Life in Pieces CBS	10.8	9.3
11	Grey’s Anatomy ABC	10.6	7.8
12	Chicago Fire NBC	10.5	7.5
13	Mom CBS Modern Family ABC Chicago P.D. NBC	10.3 10.3 10.3	8.7 7.5 7.5
16	The Blacklist NBC The Good Wife CBS	10.2 10.2	6.0 7.9
18	Law & Order: SVU NBC	10.1	7.7
19	Survivor CBS	10.0	8.3
20	American Idol (Thursday) Fox American Idol (Wednesday) Fox	9.8 9.8	8.2 8.2
22	The X-Files Fox	9.7	7.1
23	Chicago Med NBC Scandal ABC Elementary CBS The Bachelor ABC	8.9 8.9 8.9 8.9	6.7 6.1 5.9 6.1

Total viewers; in millions

Adults 18-49 chart:

RANK	SHOW & NETWORK	LIVE+3 DAYS DVR/VOD RATING	WATCHED LIVE/ SAME DAY RATING
1	The Walking Dead AMC	9.2	6.6
2	58th Grammy Awards CBS	8.1	7.7
3	The Big Bang Theory CBS	5.3	3.8
4	Modern Family ABC	3.6	2.4
5	Grey’s Anatomy ABC	3.3	2.2
6	The X-Files Fox	3.2	2.1
7	Talking Dead AMC	3.1	2.7
8	The Bachelor ABC	3.0	2.2
9	NCIS CBS The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story	2.9 2.9	2.3 1.3
11	Scandal ABC	2.8	1.8
12	How to Get Away with Murder ABC	2.7	1.5
13	The Goldbergs ABC Life in Pieces CBS Law & Order: SVU NBC	2.6 2.6 2.6	2.0 2.1 1.7
16	American Idol (Wednesday) Fox Black-ish ABC NCIS: New Orleans CBS Survivor CBS The Blacklist NBC	2.5 2.5 2.5 2.5 2.5	2.0 1.8 2.0 1.9 1.3
21	American Idol (Thursday) Fox Lucifer Fox Chicago P.D. NBC Chicago Fire NBC	2.4 2.4 2.4 2.4	2.0 1.6 1.6 1.6
25	The Middle ABC Mom CBS	2.3 2.3	1.9 1.8