LOS ANGELES — Chicago’s come-from-behind victory over Green Bay in Saturday’s wild-card round became the first NFL game to have over 30 million viewers on a streaming service.
The Bears’ 31-27 victory averaged 31.61 million on Amazon’s Prime Video, according to Nielsen, and broke the previous standard by 4 million. That mark was set on Christmas Day, when Minnesota’s win over Detroit averaged 27.52 million on Netflix.
Chicago trailed 27-16 with just under seven minutes left in the fourth quarter before Caleb Williams threw a pair of touchdown passes to lead the Bears to their first playoff win since the 2010 season.
It was the second year that Prime Video has had a playoff game. Last year’s wild-card game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Baltimore Ravens averaged 22.07 million.
It was the third season the NFL has streamed the Saturday night wild-card game. The AFC wild-card game between the Miami Dolphins and Kansas City Chiefs during the 2023 season averaged 23 million on Peacock.
Four of the five playoff games on Saturday and Sunday delivered increases from last year.
Some of the increase can be attributed to a change in the way viewers are counted. Nielsen began using its Big Data + Panel methodology for all events last September with the start of the current television season.
Earlier this year, Nielsen began measuring out-of-home viewers for all states but Hawaii and Alaska, along with including data from smart TVs along with cable and satellite set-top boxes.
Nielsen previously measured only the top 44 media markets, which covered 65% of the country.
The most-watched game of the weekend was the Sunday late-afternoon game between San Francisco and Philadelphia, which averaged 41 million on Fox. That’s a 14% increase over last year’s game between the Eagles and Green Bay in that timeslot.
The 49ers’ 23-19 victory was the most-watched wild-card game on any network since the 2021 season, when San Francisco against Dallas averaged 41.5 million on CBS.
Sunday’s game between Buffalo and Jacksonville averaged 32.71 million on CBS, making the Bills’ 27-24 win the most-watched early Sunday AFC wild-card game on any network. It was also a 5% jump over last year’s contest between the Bills and Denver.
Fox also had Saturday afternoon’s game between the Los Angeles Rams and Carolina. The Rams’ 34-31 win averaged 27.98 million, up 7% from last year’s matchup between the Los Angeles Chargers and Houston on CBS.
It was the most-watched Saturday afternoon wild-card game since NBC averaged 28.30 million for New Orleans against Seattle in 2011.
New England’s 16-3 victory over the Chargers on NBC averaged 28.9 million, down slightly from the 29 million for last year’s Washington-Tampa Bay game.
It was the most-watched prime-time event since last February’s Super Bowl on Fox.