Sunday’s Tony Awards broadcast averaged 3.5 million viewers, down about 15 percent from last year, according to preliminary Nielsen ratings data.
While not a huge drop from the 2023 show, which averaged 4.1 million viewers, the viewership was the second-lowest for a Tonys telecast since records were kept.
The drop reverses a trend from other major awards shows and live events, which have been racking up ratings gains in recent years. The Oscars (19.5 million viewers in March) and the Grammy Awards (16.9 million in February) recorded three consecutive years of viewership growth as they climbed from record lows in the early 2020s.
It also means the Tonys missed out on an Emmy win. In January, the strike-delayed Emmys drew just over four million viewers, coming dangerously close to the Tonys. A decade ago, the Emmys had eight million more viewers than the Tonys. The next Emmy ceremony is in September.
The Tonys, which aired on CBS, featured performances from Alicia Keys and Jay-Z and included major wins for “Stereophonic,” “The Outsiders,” “Appropriate” and “Merrily We Roll Along.” The event received rave reviews from critics, including Jesse Green of The New York Times, who called it “a vast improvement” over previous years. Ariana DeBose hosted the show for the third time in a row.
Given their relatively low ratings, the Tonys have long been more of a prestige show than a big money-maker for CBS, which has aired the awards since the late 1970s. CBS has signed up to air the Tonys until 2026.
The event is also a critical marketing tool for Broadway, which is still struggling to match pre-pandemic attendance figures.
The least-watched Tonys remain the 2021 telecast altered by the pandemic, when fewer than three million people tuned in. The most-watched recent Tony was the 2016 show fueled by “Hamilton,” which drew more than eight million viewers.
