Despite attracting impressive audiences that would delight any professional sports league, the NFL’s Divisional Round doubleheader on Sunday saw its viewership hit four-year lows.
According to Jon Lewis of Sports Media Watch, the game between the Baltimore Ravens and Buffalo Bills averaged 42.2 million viewers, a decline of 16% from last year’s matchup featuring the Kansas City Chiefs against the Bills, which had 50.4 million viewers. This matchup marked the least-watched Divisional Round game in the late Sunday window since the 2021 game between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and New Orleans Saints, which drew 35.5 million viewers on Fox.
Even with this double-digit drop from last season, the Ravens-Bills game still recorded the highest viewership of the NFL season to date, surpassing the viewership of the Thanksgiving Day game between the New York Giants and Dallas Cowboys. On NBC, the afternoon game between the Los Angeles Rams and Philadelphia Eagles averaged 37.8 million viewers, including additional streaming figures from Adobe Analytics, which is a 6% decrease from last year’s Buccaneers-Lions game that captured 40.4 million viewers by the same metrics.
🏈❄️ Rams-Eagles NFC Divisional Playoff is Audience Blockbuster for NBC Sports
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— NBC Sports PR (@NBCSportsPR) January 21, 2025
This too represented a four-year low for the Sunday afternoon Divisional Round window. According to Lewis, eight out of ten NFL playoff games this season have seen a year-over-year decline. The exceptions include the Saturday afternoon Texans-Chiefs game, which saw a slight increase when compared to the Texans-Ravens game last season on ESPN/ABC, and the Broncos-Bills Wild Card game last Sunday on CBS, which matched the viewership of last year’s Steelers-Bills Wild Card game that was postponed due to weather.
These declines may indicate the strength of last year’s playoff slate rather than poor performances in the current season. Last year’s playoffs featured the Dallas Cowboys and Kansas City Chiefs—two of the league’s biggest draws—playing in the Wild Card round. The Chiefs advanced to win the Super Bowl, while the Cowboys faced an early exit. However, the current playoffs have two fewer games featuring these top viewership teams: the Chiefs had a first-round bye, and the Cowboys did not qualify for the postseason.
In today’s television landscape, these viewership numbers are still considerable achievements. The NFL is well-positioned for significant audiences in the upcoming Championship Round, with the Chiefs and Bills reigniting their rivalry on Sunday evening and one of the league’s rising stars, Jayden Daniels, leading the Washington Commanders into Philadelphia to face the Eagles.
