Initially, the company, which owns ABC and Hulu, had indicated a decline in ratings for the ceremony, where the indie film Anora, centered on a sex worker, won multiple awards. However, Disney revealed that an additional 1.6 million viewers watched the show on mobile devices, bringing the total live viewership to 19.69 million.
In a statement, Disney noted, “As viewing habits continue to shift, there is potential for a significant gap between initial and final viewership numbers.” The company added, “For Sunday night’s live broadcast of The Oscars, we observed substantial growth in younger audiences tuning in via mobile and PC platforms, which was not reflected in the early ratings.”
This updated figure marks the highest Oscars viewership in five years. While this year’s ceremony was the first to stream live, technical issues disrupted the broadcast, leaving some viewers unable to watch the final awards being presented.
The revised viewership number represents a slight increase from last year’s preliminary ratings of 19.5 million, when Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer swept the awards and performances from the Barbie soundtrack captivated audiences.
Oscars ratings hit a low of 10.4 million during the COVID-19 pandemic, a stark contrast to the event’s heyday a decade ago, when it regularly attracted over 40 million viewers.