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It’s only days into the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics, but from ratings to engagement, NBCUniversal is off to a winning start.
Today, NBCU announced it’s delivering the highest Olympic and Paralympic ad revenue in history, securing more advertisers than the Rio and Tokyo Olympics combined, with nearly $500 million coming from first-time sponsors.
Additionally, 70% of advertisers are new, and digital ad revenue has doubled that of the Tokyo Olympics in 2020.
“The 2024 Paris Games have delivered a uniquely powerful halo for brands at an incredible scale with a highly engaged and passionate audience,” Mark Marshall, chairman of global advertising and partnerships at NBCU, said in a statement. “We are proud to have secured the highest Olympic and Paralympic advertising in the history of the Games and are grateful to our advertisers for their partnership.”
NBCU announced it was on track to break the Tokyo record of $1.25 billion in April, securing $1.2 billion months in advance.
And with those results, advertisers are reaping rewards.
Ratings are in
On Sunday, NBCUniversal had its best ratings yet for its 2024 Olympics coverage, with 41.5 million viewers tuning in on NBC, Peacock and across NBCU platforms, according to custom fast national data from Nielsen and Adobe Analytics—nearly doubling viewership for the opening Sunday competition of the Tokyo Olympics in 2020, which averaged 21.7 million across all platforms.
Some of the highlights driving those numbers included Simone Biles leading the U.S. to the top score in the women’s gymnastics qualifier, the 1-2 finish by Torri Huske and Gretchen Walsh in the 100m butterfly, and the U.S. women’s rugby team topping Brazil.
The numbers continue NBCU’s stellar performance this Olympics, with Friday’s Opening Ceremony averaging 34.5 million viewers across the combined Paris Prime (2-5 p.m. ET) and U.S. primetime (8-11 p.m. ET/PT) periods, according to the company. That’s up 79% from the Tokyo Olympics.
According to Samba TV, 9.9 million U.S. households watched the Opening Ceremony during the L+0D (live or on the same day) window. Meanwhile, Asian households overindexed by the highest margin (+9%) during that time.
