The Super Bowl, held Feb. 8 in San Francisco, ranked as the second most-watched ever in America with an average minute audience of over 124.9 million viewers. How, you ask, did it do in Canada?
In terms of same day estimates, and seen across Canada on a total of 31 CTV and TSN stations, the game drew 5,793,000 viewers. The 40-minute “kickoff” show was seen by a little over four million.
I don’t have the estimates showing how many tuned in on RDS, but add that to the total and it would be well over six-, six-and-a-quarter million. More watched on Bell digital platforms such as Crave, bringing the grand total, according to a Bell Media release, to 6.8 million. As with most trends in the digital era, the live streaming portion of the audience was up in Canada over the previous year.
The media company also estimates that 9.6 million in Canada watched the halftime show headlined by Bad Bunny, who did better in Canada, proportionally, than he did in America. Not in anglais? Pas de problème.
The game itself has done better in past years north of the border. In 2024, for example, Super Bowl LVIII, featuring Taylor Swift’s favourite team, drew 8.6 million.
There are several reasons for the two-million tumble. One, the tilt between Seattle and New England was a dull, one-sides affair, especially the low scoring first half.
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Second, The Super Bowl had some Olympic competition this year. Most viewers, however, watched the Games live in the Morning on CBC/Sportsnet (585k/117k)), and Daytime (1,208k/348k), with fewer sticking around for the primetime reply (472K/151k).
The third reason, I think, is that many Canadians are still not in the mood to join America’s biggest flag waver. Obviously millions still want to see football’s biggest event or at least have it on in the background while consuming Doritos and chili, but retaliatory viewer tariffs apparently remain in place.
As for the coveted post-Super Bowl slot, CTV used it to launch its new Shaftesbury crime drama The Borderline starring Canadian lads Stephen Amell (Arrow) and Hamza Haq (Transplant). Overnight estimates show the series drew 520,000 on CTV Feb. 8 in that post-game, 10:30 p.m. slot. That premiere total would have been boosted by those who streamed it on Crave, where the series will continue to stream weekly with new episodes every Friday.
