2024–25 NHL Season Sees Double-Digit Drop in U.S. TV Viewership
In a season that felt doomed from the start — with a remote broadcast on Opening Night due to a hurricane — viewership never seemed to recover from the early declines, and not even the Four Nations tournament could provide a meaningful boost to the league’s regular season numbers.
The 2024-25 NHL regular season averaged 435,000 viewers across the networks of ESPN and TNT Sports, down 11% from last year (490K) and the least-watched season under the current television deal. If you include the Four Nations numbers — which I view as bad faith due to the event functioning more like an international showcase, like the Olympics, than a standard All-Star Game — then overall viewership was miraculously up 24% from last year.
A downward-trending season — which began with the league’s Opening Night tripleheader on ESPN, averaged just 559,000 viewers across the three games and was down 39% year-over-year. It was certainly expected that the league’s Opening Night wouldn’t match the Bedard-fueled 2023 opener, which set a record with 1.43 million viewers for his debut against Boston, a number never before seen on Opening Night. Then, add in the co-existing broadcast in the Florida area for ESPN’s 'primary' game between the Bruins and Panthers due to the hurricane, along with two other games featuring a West Coast team at 1:30 local time and a rebranded franchise among the league’s lowest draws in the late window — and you get a recipe for mediocrity with the matchups at hand.
Shifting to storylines, the season saw some of the league’s biggest draws — Boston, New York, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Philadelphia, and Chicago — all disappoint, missing the postseason for the first time ever in the same year. This made it practically unfathomable for the league to surpass last year’s most-watched regular season in nearly a decade. Furthermore, not even Ovechkin’s 'Gr8Chase' could drive much viewership, outside of his record-breaking game, which averaged 905,000 viewers and became the most-watched non-Winter Classic NHL game ever on TNT, airing in a noon slot — a time slot that would have certainly been reserved for the main NBC network in the previous television deal.
On a brighter note — though there weren’t many — the league saw surprisingly strong numbers for this year’s Stadium Series matchup between the Red Wings and Blue Jackets, which averaged 1.59 million viewers on ESPN. That made it the most-watched Stadium Series game since 2019 and the most-watched NHL regular-season game on ESPN/ABC since Disney re-acquired the league’s rights in 2021. Additionally, the number becomes even more impressive when compared to the three previous Stadium Series games, all of which aired on ABC: 1.1 million, 1.13 million, and 1.57 million viewers, respectively.
When it came to scheduling, several decisions left many people dumbfounded. For one, TNT Sports aired 19 non-exclusive broadcasts — the most on record — which clearly hurt potential viewership growth. Additionally, ABC’s slate lacked much strength in marquee matchups, with some puzzling choices that expectedly failed to generate interest. One example was the Kraken-Flyers game on March 8, which drew just 580,000 viewers. Another was a Rangers-Blackhawks matchup on January 5 that aired opposite the NFL and ended up drawing just 454,000 viewers — the smallest network audience ever recorded for an NHL game.
The lack of flex scheduling once again hurt the league — this time more than usual — as both ESPN and TNT recorded their lowest-viewed doubleheaders under the current media deal. ESPN’s Tuesday, April 15th doubleheader averaged just 197,000 viewers across Panthers–Lightning and Kings–Kraken. Similarly, TNT’s April 16th doubleheader averaged only 165,000 viewers, featuring Red Wings–Devils — a non-exclusive game — followed by Golden Knights–Canucks.
Overall, network averages were down across the board this season. ESPN averaged 422,000 viewers, down 13% from last year and marking its least-watched season under the current deal. The Worldwide Leader’s top audience — outside of Opening Night — came from the Capitals–Penguins matchup on the final day of the regular season, which averaged 535,000 viewers. That likely wasn’t what the network expected to be its top non–Opening Night draw, all things considered.
TNT Sports wrapped up its least-watched NHL season to date, averaging just 317,000 viewers across TNT and truTV, a 12% decline from last year. A dip in numbers that was certainly worsened by the high number of non-exclusive games. The network’s top telecast was the Winter Classic (920K), narrowly edging out Alex Ovechkin’s record-breaking performance against the Islanders (905K).
On the network side, ABC averaged 865,000 viewers for its slate of games, down 7% from last year. Surprisingly, ABC’s top game of the season came on February 8, when the Golden Knights–Bruins drew 1.27 million viewers — making it the most-watched non-Stadium Series regular season game to air on the network under the current deal.
All things considered, the 2024–25 NHL season wasn’t a good year for the league’s viewership numbers. For some historical context, though, this year’s average of 435,000 viewers was still higher than NBC Sports’ final four seasons with the league. Still, the instability of ESPN’s scheduling, the heavy reliance on cable, the lack of consistent broadcast television presence, and the high number of non-exclusive games are all worrisome factors under the current media deal — ones that will have to be addressed if the league ever wants to truly thrive with its network partners. At the end of the day, the league’s executives are probably still fat and happy with the money rolling in, so who knows if any meaningful changes will happen. Until then, this year’s Stanley Cup Playoffs will roll on!