The Late Late Toy Show once again topped the list of the most-watched television last year and was the only non-sport programme in a top 10 completed by the Ireland men’s rugby team, the two big GAA finals and England’s defeat to Spain in Euro 2024.
RTÉ's festive phenomenon had a tally of 1,525,800 viewers on RTÉ One alone, according to consolidated figures released by industry body TAM Ireland and research company Nielsen.
This linear audience was down 50,000 on the comparable audience for Patrick Kielty’s first outing on the show the year before, but separate RTÉ-released figures indicate that its 622,000 streams on the RTÉ Player were up by more than 70,000, suggesting that there has been no net decline in popularity.
For the first time since 2018, the All-Ireland senior hurling final attracted more viewers than the football final.
Clare v Cork was watched by an average of 1,046,100 people on RTÉ2 and was in third place overall, with the Armagh v Galway football final in sixth with 889,600. The viewing figures in all cases are for the Republic of Ireland’s television market only and player streams are excluded.
Spain v England, the final of Uefa Euro 2024 in July, was fifth, with 918,100 viewers watching Spain win 2-1 over Gareth Southgate’s team as they vied to win their first major tournament since 1966.
But rugby dominated the top 10, with Ireland’s emphatic victory over France in the Six Nations back in February second only to the Toy Show, garnering 1,077,200 viewers for Virgin Media One.
There were four other Six Nations fixtures in the top 10, with a dramatic England v Ireland game at Twickenham coming fourth with 974,400 viewers on RTÉ2.
Ireland’s game against Italy was seventh with 885,900 viewers on Virgin Media One, while the Scotland game was eighth with 874,700 viewers on the same channel. The game against Wales, shown on RTÉ2, was close behind in ninth spot with an audience of 872,400.
Rugby also occupied 10th position in the list, with Ireland v New Zealand in the autumn nations series bringing in 870,300 viewers to Virgin Media One.
Overall, sport accounted for 32 of the top 50 most-watched programmes of last year, with that number including the rain-soaked opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Paris (44th with 448,800 viewers on RTÉ2).
The most-watched Paris 2024 programme was in 22nd with 575,100 viewers on RTÉ2, but as the figures are averages, with viewing spread across several hours, this doesn’t capture how individual Olympic events draw in massive audiences.
RTÉ noted that the viewership for Kellie Harrington’s gold-winning fight peaked at 1.4 million, Rhasidat Adeleke’s women’s 400m final peaked at 926,000 and the Irish women’s 4 x 400m final peaked at 910,000.
The dominance of sport, however, is assisted by the fact that only the most-watched episode of a particular programme is included in the list, but most sporting events are individually titled.
Entertainment, news and scripted
After the Late Late Toy Show, the biggest non-sport show of the year was the most-watched episode of I’m a Celebrity ... Get Me Out of Here!
The reality series, an ITV import, won 681,500 viewers for Virgin Media One and was in 13th place, up from 34th and 508,500 viewers in 2023. Its popularity was likely swelled in 2024 by the participation of Coleen Rooney, who came second behind Danny Jones from the band McFly, and Love Island’s Maura Higgins, one of three Irish contestants in a strong line-up.
After not appearing at all in the 2023 list, the Eurovision Song Contest also enjoyed better fortunes last year, with Ireland’s first qualification for the grand final since 2018, courtesy of Bambie Thug’s Doomsday Blue, boosting its audience on RTÉ One to 674,200, putting it in 14th place.
Other notable programmes across the top 50 include RTÉ lifestyle behemoth Room to Improve, with the Dermot Bannon show’s most-watched episode in 16th place, pulling in 664,300 viewers.
Stayed in on New Year’s Eve? Then you might have been one of the 583,600 people calculated by TAM/Nielsen to have watched New Year’s Eve Live on RTÉ One, which saw singer Cian Ducrot ring in 2025 from a concert at Dublin Castle. This was 21st on the list.
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Other RTÉ One entertainment shows to feature include Dancing with the Stars (558,300, 25th place), the Rose of Tralee International Festival (543,400, 27th place), the Tommy Tiernan Show (503,200, 31st place) and the most-watched non-toy edition of the Late Late Show (472,300, 36th place).
RTE’s news and current affairs output also had a good showing, with the most-watched Six One and 9pm news bulletins both appearing in the top 20. Ahead of the general election, the Prime Time Leaders’ Debate was 26th with 551,700 viewers, while the Upfront with Katie Hannon Leader’s Debate Special was 35th with 474,300.
The investigative documentary Bishop Casey’s Buried Secrets by reporter Anne Sheridan was 30th with 514,900 viewers, also on RTÉ One.
But with no new drama hit to replicate the appeal of family gangster series Kin, it was a less successful year on linear television for scripted programming. The most-watched scripted show was Mrs Brown’s Boys, with its 476,300 viewers on RTÉ One giving it 34th spot.
Fair City (454,500, 42nd place) and The Young Offenders (441,700, 46th place), both on RTÉ One, were the only other scripted shows in the top 50, reflecting the impact of on-demand viewing on how people consume drama and comedy.
On-demand impact
Among Irish homes with traditional sets, the average adult watched broadcast television on a TV set – either live or recorded to a set-top box – for two hours and 30 minutes every day, which was down just two minutes on the average in 2023.
Over a longer period of time, the shift in habits is clearer. A decade ago, in 2014, the average daily viewing time for broadcast television was estimated to be almost an hour longer at three hours and 28 minutes.
When it comes to watching all forms of video content on a TV set, TAM Ireland said its analysis found viewers in the Irish market last year spent an average of three hours and 23 minutes a day doing this.
Some 77 per cent of this is broadcaster content, 10 per cent is subscription video-on-demand content from Netflix, Disney Plus, Prime Video and others, 4 per cent is YouTube videos and the rest is content from other non-subscription video streaming services, it said.
Broadcasters are themselves enjoying substantial growth in streaming. The RTÉ Player reached a record 142 million streams in 2024, up 42 per cent year-on-year, RTÉ said in new end-of-year figures.
A breakdown of RTÉ Player streams last year confirms how scripted shows tend to do better on-demand and usually benefit from greater longevity than other genres. While Uefa 2024 was the top performer on the RTÉ Player last year, with almost 8.8 million streams across the tournament, BBC soap opera EastEnders was second and not far behind with a total of 8.5 million streams over the full year.
Paris 2024 was third with 7.2 million streams, but this was followed by soaps Home and Away with 6.9 million and RTÉ-produced Fair City with 6 million.
Data compiled for RTÉ by Piano Analytics show that 12 of the top 20 performing programmes on the RTÉ Player in 2024 were scripted, with US drama Yellowstone, Love/Hate, Neighbours, Shortland Street, The Young Offenders, kids’ TV mega-hit Bluey, Kin, The Dry and Normal People all featuring.
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