The TV audience for the 2026 Oscars declined some, in keeping with a pattern from other recent awards shows.
Sunday’s 98th Academy Awards drew 17.86 million viewers on ABC and Hulu, based on Nielsen’s big data plus panel ratings. That’s down about 9 percent from last year’s Oscars, which drew 19.69 million viewers for a post-pandemic high, and the smallest audience for the awards since 2022, when 16.68 million people watched.
The show delivered a 3.92 rating among adults 18-49 (equivalent to about 5.34 million people in that age group), a 14 percent decline from 4.54 last year.
On the plus side, the Oscars maintained its usual spot as the most watched primetime entertainment telecast of the season. The show’s social media stats also were up significantly, rising by 42 percent to more than 181 million impressions during the telecast (according to Talkwalker’s Social Content Ratings).
One Battle After Another and Sinners ruled the night, with the former winning six Oscars (including best picture and best director for Paul Thomas Anderson) and Sinners taking home four awards (including a best actor win for Michael B. Jordan and best original screenplay for Ryan Coogler). Conan O’Brien took his second turn as host of the awards.
The Oscars followed the trend of the season’s other two big awards telecasts, albeit with a slightly steeper drop. Both the Golden Globes in January and the Grammy Awards in February fell by about 6 percent vs. their 2025 editions.
The telecast was marred by audio glitches and other technical issues — though not the streaming problems that plagued last year’s ceremony, the first to live stream on Hulu — and cut off a couple of winners while letting some scripted bits go on too long. The show also, however, featured heartfelt speeches by Jordan and best actress winner Jessie Buckley, well-received musical performances of nominated songs from Sinners and KPop Demon Hunters (the latter’s “Golden” took home the award) and funny opening and closing filmed pieces featuring O’Brien riffing on the nominated films.
The Oscars also had an unusual, and unexpected, bit of competition Sunday night in the form of a World Baseball Classic semifinal between the United States and the Dominican Republic. FS1 and Fox Deportes’ telecast of the game drew 7.37 million viewers, the largest audience ever for a WBC contest in the United States.