The Bachelors premiere struggles in the ratings after format reboot

Ratings are in for the first episode of The Bachelor after a major shake-up of the franchise – but the drastic change hasn’t paid off.

Despite a major shake-up to one of its biggest shows amid a battle for viewers, the ratings are in, and it’s not looking good for Channel 10.

After being postponed from its original airdate late last year, The Bachelors — a reboot of the Bachelor franchise this season starring three suitors instead of one — premiered to 309,000 metro viewers on Monday night, peaking at 478,000, its lowest premiere in franchise history.

Including live stream viewers and on Ten’s on-demand service, the total audience number was 439,000.

Felix Von Hofe, Jed McIntosh and Thomas Malucelli are the three Bachelors in 2023. Picture: Channel 10

The much-hyped reboot came fourth in its timeslot, behind Seven’s airing of Prince Harry’s ITV interview (487,000 viewers), ABC’s 7:30 (422,000 viewers) and a repeat of RBT on Nine (315,000 viewers).

The Bachelors premiered immediately after The Project, which featured Prince Harry’s US 60 Minutes interview and its new line-up with Sarah Harris at the helm. The Project last night started the year with 327,000 metro viewers, and 438,000 nationally.

Set in a new Gold Coast setting, episode one of The Bachelor included a brutal speed-dating format to kick things off.

The “mini-dates” made for a surprisingly savage opening twist to this new season, as all three Bachelors went on a seemingly endless series of meet-ups with women selected by producers as potential love matches, with only 10 roses each to hand out.

One contestant's mini-date with Felix was a raunchy body painting session.

While the episode pulled a low audience compared to previous seasons, which usually premiere in the middle of the year, it was the number 1 show in the timeslot among 16 to 39-year-olds.

Bachelor ratings have been on a the decline over the past few years.

In July 2021, the last time the show aired, pilot Jimmy Nicholson pulled 482,000 viewers on night one, and in August 2020, Locky Gilbert’s stint had an audience of 681,000. It was quite a drop from Matt Agnew’s July 2019 season premiere, which had an impressive 828,000 viewers.

This year’s 309k premiere result is also far lower than ratings for I’m A Celebrity … Get Me Out Of Here! which usually airs on Ten in the early January prime time slot taken by The Bachelors this year.

Last year, the jungle-based reality show opened to 749,000 viewers across the five metro cities, and in 2021, it premiered to more than a million viewers. This year, it will instead begin in April.

The Bachelors’ disappointing premiere result comes after a difficult year for Ten.

In the back end of 2022, the network recorded a string of ratings headaches, including its newest reality show, The Challenge Australia, being bumped to a later timeslot and then to the network’s multichannel, 10 Shake. Other new reality TV offerings The Real Love Boat and The Traitors also struggled to attract viewers, while 10 News First Breakfast was axed after dismal ratings results.

Former Bachelorette contestant Ciarran Stott was one of the stars competing in The Challenge Australia.

It was a year of chopping and changing for Ten, with Studio 10 pushed back to a 10am start time, and slashed from three-and-a half to two hours a day.

In December, The Australian reported that 30,000 viewers had been tuning into the show.

The network also experienced a “mass exodus” of presenters last year, with Natasha Exelby, Carrie Bickmore, Peter Helliar and Lisa Wilkinson all announcing their resignation in quick succession.