Custom Survey from Nielsen and NFL Reveals Total Viewing Audience for Super Bowl LVII was Approximately 200 Million Viewers

The National Football League commissioned a survey from Nielsen, a leading media measurement and analytics company, to complement Nielsen's audience measurement data and provide further insights into how many people in the U.S. watched Super Bowl LVII on February 12, 2023, particularly in group settings. According to the custom survey, Super Bowl LVII reached approximately 200 million viewers, or 60% of all people in the United States. This is a 9% increase compared with the nearly 183 million unique viewers initially reported to have watched at least one minute of Super Bowl LVII between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles earlier this month. The survey also revealed that the average minute audience was approximately 136 million viewers.

The Super Bowl stands alone in the sports and entertainment spheres as an event in which a larger portion of viewers watch in out-of-home group settings. The custom survey of 5,189 households examined the size of viewing groups, regardless of location, and to what extent those groups are larger than that which is measured today. The survey was conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago using the AmeriSpeak panel.

"The Super Bowl is singular across the television and media landscape not only in its unparalleled viewership, but because it is largely watched in group settings," said Paul Ballew, Chief Data and Analytics Officer of the NFL. "With that in mind, additional measurement is needed in order to have a complete picture of the total viewership of this special event and the results of this custom survey with Nielsen illustrate the true magnitude of the Super Bowl."

"Nielsen has measured Super Bowl viewership for over 50 years giving us a front row seat to the vast changes in how and where fans watch the Big Game," said Jon Stainer, Nielsen Global Sports Managing Director. "We recognize the uniqueness of this media event around group viewing parties and this additional custom survey helps supplement our audience measurement."

Following the game, it was reported that 182.6 million unique viewers watched at least one minute of the Super Bowl LVII telecast, which was broadcast on FOX, FOX Deportes, and across various FOX and NFL digital platforms, and that it had an average audience of 113.1 million viewers, making it one of the top three most-watched Super Bowls of all time.