NIGHTLY NEWS WITH LESTER HOLT Wins 2016 Across the Board

NBC NIGHTLY NEWS WITH LESTER HOLT ranked #1 across the board in 2016, averaging 8.5 million total viewers, leading ABC by +170,000 (+2%) and CBS by +1.556 million (+22%). This marks the ninth consecutive year that Nightly News won across the board.

For the year, Nightly News averaged 2.1 million A25-54 viewers, outperforming ABC by +263,000 (+14%) and CBS by +490,000 (+31%). Nightly News more than tripled its A25-54 lead over ABC compared to 2015 (+263,000 vs. +84,000 in 2015) and it was the only evening newscast to see a gain in A25-54 from the previous year (+24,000, or +1%). The broadcast had its best year in A25-54 impressions since 2014 and biggest advantage over ABC since 2012. Nightly News averaged 1.519 million A18-49 viewers in 2016, +208,000 (+16%) higher than ABC and +420,000 (+38%) more than CBS. The NBC News broadcast posted the biggest A18-49 gain vs. 2015 (+43,000, or +3%) and improved its advantage over ABC by 61% (+208,000 vs. +129,000 in 2015).

Nightly News won December 2016 across the board, delivering its biggest monthly total viewer win in eight months (excluding the Olympics). The NBC News broadcast has ranked #1 in total viewers for 16 of the 18 months since Lester Holt started anchoring and it has won all 18 months in the demo during that time. Nightly News also ranked #1 among A25-54 and A18-49 for Q4 2016.

For the week of December 19, Nightly News averaged 9.2 million total viewers, leading "ABC World News Tonight" by +554,000 viewers (+6%) and "CBS Evening News" by +2 million viewers (+28%). It marks the fifth straight across-the-board win for the NBC News broadcast, making Nightly News the only evening newscast to win at least five straight weeks among total viewers since 2007. Excluding the Rio Olympics, this was Nightly News' biggest advantage over ABC since the week of March 21, 2016.

Nightly News continues its dominance in the demo, averaging 2.2 million A25-54 viewers for the week, leading ABC by +440,000 (+25%) and CBS by +673,000 (+44%). Compared to the same week last season, Nightly News expanded its A25-54 leads over both ABC (+31%) and CBS (+26%). Nightly News posted its biggest non-Olympics demo win over ABC since the week of January 18, 2016.

Among A18-49, Nightly News averaged 1.7 million viewers for the week, topping ABC by +366,000 (+28%) and CBS by +574,000 (+53%). The NBC News broadcast has ranked #1 in A25-54 and A18-49 for 73 of the last 74 weeks. Excluding the Rio Olympics, Nightly held its biggest A18-49 leads over ABC and CBS since the week of November 16, 2015.

For the week of December 19, Nightly News is based on a three-day average (Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday) while CBS and ABC are based on five-day averages.

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