Seven tops as Nine's souffle wobbles

THE X Factor and the solid Australian drama Winners & Losers propelled Seven to another nightly win on Tuesday as Nine's Bake-Off fell.

THE X Factor and the solid Australian drama Winners & Losers propelled Seven to another nightly win on Tuesday.

Seven’s talent contest again ranked top for the night with 1.416 million viewers in the five capital cities and 2.184 million nationally, according to preliminary OzTAM figures.

Winners & Losers continued its strong ratings result this year, registering its fourth consecutive audience of more than a million metropolitan viewers after opening with less than 900,000 in its first three episodes. Just as importantly for advertisers, it ranked second for the night among 25-54 year-olds and 18-49 year-olds.

Seven won the night in all people with a 25.6 per cent channel share ahead of Nine’s 18.4 per cent, Ten’s 15.2 per cent and ABC1’s 12.7 per cent. Seven extended its channel share lead thanks to 7TWO, which topped the multichannels with a 4.6 per cent share and gave it a network share of 33.1 per cent.

Ten’s stronger performance was led by The Project registering one of its best numbers for the year (688,000), Under The Dome holding steady with 840,000 viewers and Masterchef Australia, which was in the top five programs among 18-49 year-olds and 16-39 year-olds. But a heavily-promoted cliffhanger for Neighbours on Eleven didn’t fare as well as expected, averaging 285,000 viewers.

Nine’s The Great Australian Bake-Off is falling like a weak soufflé, losing viewers ahead of its finale to 622,000 last night. Big Brother sustained a solid 871,000 viewers but this is the lowest rating nominations episode for the reality series since it moved to Nine.

On pay-TV, Australia’s Next Top Model averaged 100,000 viewers nationally for its first screening.

OVERNIGHT OZTAM RANKINGS, AUGUST 20
1 THE X FACTOR Seven 1,416,000
2 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,212,000
3 NINE NEWS Nine 1,193,000
4 WINNERS & LOSERS Seven 1,009,000
5 A CURRENT AFFAIR Nine 1,004,000
6 TODAY TONIGHT Seven 979,000
7 ABC NEWS ABC1 928,000
8 HOME AND AWAY Seven 916,000
9 BIG BROTHER Nine 871,000
10 UNDER THE DOME Ten 840,000
11 MASTERCHEF AUSTRALIA Ten 808,000
12 NEW TRICKS ABC1 806,000
13 THE PROJECT Ten 688,000
14 FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT ABC1 687,000
15 7.30 ABC1 673,000
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