The power of NFL football to draw hefty audience was once again on display during ESPN’s Monday Night Football Week 5 matchup (October 7, 8:15 p.m. ET) between the Saints and Chiefs, which drew nearly 16 million viewers, according to newly released data.
That made it ESPN’s most-watched MNF game not simulcast on ABC since November of the 2019 season (50+ games).
Dating back to 2015 and accounting for the last 10 seasons (2015-24), the Saints-Chiefs clash is the fourth-most-watched Monday Night Football game which was not simulcast on ABC (135+ games), ESPN reported.
The audience of 15,910,000 for Saints-Chiefs (ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN Deportes) bested the audience of Monday Night Football’s 2022 Week 5 Raiders-Chiefs game (15,888,000 viewers on ESPN and ESPN Deportes), which also was not simulcast on ABC and represented ESPN’s most-watched, non-ABC simulcast game since Nov. 2019 prior to this week.
ESPN also reported that Monday Night Football with Peyton and Eli continues to grow its audience in the 2024 season. Monday Night Football with Peyton and Eli delivered 1.4 million viewers (ESPN2), the show’s best audience in its last seven episodes, dating back to the 2023 Eagles-Chiefs matchup. This season, the show has increased its audience each of its three episodes (Weeks 1, 2 and 5).
In addition, Monday Night Countdown (6-8 p.m.) averaged 1.2 million viewers, up 6% from its Week 5 edition in 2023, ESPN said.
