'Who Wants to Be a Millionaire' Tops Primetime for Third Straight Week as Viewership Keeps Climbing
"Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" has been the No. 1 primetime entertainment program in total viewers for three consecutive weeks, and its audience has grown every single week since the season premiered on July 22.
The Aug. 12 episode averaged 4.41 million viewers, up 2% from the previous week's 4.33 million, according to Nielsen's National Live+Same Day Big Data Plus Panel Program Ratings — a measurement that counts viewers who watched live or recorded the show and played it back the same day. That made it the most-watched show of the night, beating CBS' "Big Brother" by 28% in total viewers, and the most-watched primetime entertainment program of the week, topping NBC's "America's Got Talent" by 19%. Variety
It was the quiz show's best performance since the July 30, 2025 episode in which Matt Damon and Ken Jennings won $1 million for charity. That episode drew 6.52 million viewers, making it the most-watched "Millionaire" episode in five years — going back to June 4, 2020, during the first season hosted by Jimmy Kimmel. Variety
The Aug. 12 broadcast featured Jesse Eisenberg and Paul Giamatti in the hot seat, followed by Krysten Ritter and Sarah Shahi. The celebrity-pair format, a staple of this ABC revival, has this season also brought in Larry David and his daughter Cazzie David, Jason Alexander and Wayne Knight, Tig Notaro and Pete Holmes, Brad Paisley and Clayton Kershaw, and Michael Kosta and Wendi McLendon-Covey. Ben Affleck and "Jeopardy!" champion Jamie Ding took home the top prize for charity during the season. Variety
The show will take a hiatus after its next Wednesday episode, which pairs comedians Paul Scheer and Rob Huebel, followed by Awkwafina and director Paul Feig. It returns with its season's final three episodes on three consecutive Wednesdays: Oct. 7, 14 and 21, as listed in ABC's Fall 2026 premiere schedule. Variety ABC
Still to come before the break and after it: Will Forte and Taran Killam, Colin Jost and Michael Che, Michael Keaton and Jon Lovett, Timothy Simons and Jackie Tohn, Billy Porter and Leslie Odom Jr., and Sarah Jane Nader and Brooks Nader. Variety
The series is produced by Sony Pictures Television's Embassy Row and Kimmelot, with Michael Davies and Jimmy Kimmel as executive producers. Variety
For a format that first premiered on ABC in 1999 and has been revived, shelved and revived again, the steady week-to-week climb this summer is the kind of trajectory a network schedules around — and ABC has, slotting the back half of the season into a prime fall position at 9:00 p.m. on Wednesdays.
