Jimmy Kimmel Live Turns Brooklyn Week Into an 11-Year Ratings High
Jimmy Kimmel Live has closed its 2026 Brooklyn week with 2.66 million total viewers, its most-watched Brooklyn run in 11 years.
That average also kept the ABC show at No. 1 in late night for the second week in a row this season, according to Variety.
The shows aired live from the Howard Gilman Opera House at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. It is the show's regular New York base, a theatre-sized room that lets a Los Angeles production play to an East Coast crowd for a week.
The year-on-year jump was sharp. Total viewers rose 21% from 2.20 million for last year's New York edition to 2.66 million this year.
Younger viewing moved too. The show averaged a 0.27 rating in adults 18-49, the advertisers' favourite age group, up 23% from 0.22 a year ago. That was its best 18-49 result for a Brooklyn week in seven years.
The Brooklyn high followed a strong return. For the week of Sept. 21, the season premiere week, the show averaged 2.29 million viewers and a 0.21 rating in adults 18-49, also No. 1 in late night, according to Variety. Put simply, more people watched in Brooklyn than in the first week back.
Demand for seats was heavy. The Brooklyn run drew more than 150,000 ticket requests, according to Variety.
What makes this stand out is how familiar the Brooklyn trip has become. ABC first sent the show east for five original broadcasts from the same venue starting on Oct. 19, 2015. The 2017 visit was billed as Back to Brooklyn, and another run was scheduled for Oct. 15-19 in 2018.
For fans, this means the usual way to catch up still applies. Jimmy Kimmel Live airs weeknights at 11:35 p.m. ET, 10:35 p.m. CT, and episodes stream on Hulu, according to ABC. ABC's listings point to a packed goodbye stretch, with John Oliver, Seth Meyers and Robby Hoffman on Oct. 2, Paul McCartney, Sen. Bernie Sanders and musical guest Goose on Oct. 3, and Jessica Chastain and Malcolm Gladwell on Oct. 8.
The longer trend favours New York. The 2022 Brooklyn shows averaged 1.63 million total viewers, and the 2025 edition was up 35% on that figure. The 2026 week has now lifted the franchise to a new recent peak.
