Overview
- Opening Week averaged 2.8 million viewers across NBC Sports, ESPN and Prime Video, up about 60% year over year and the highest for a traditional Opening Week since 2017.
- Prime Video’s first exclusive Friday doubleheader averaged 1.25 million viewers, marking the first NBA games to air only on a streaming service.
- Celtics–Knicks drew 1.17 million viewers in the early window, up 41% versus last year’s comparable game, while Timberwolves–Lakers averaged about 1.32–1.33 million, down roughly 4% from 2024’s late game.
- The Friday package delivered 659,000 viewers in adults 18–49, up 21% from last year’s comparable ESPN doubleheader, with a median viewer age of 45.6 versus 53.3 on NBC and ESPN.
- NBC and Peacock averaged a combined 5.6 million viewers on Opening Night and ESPN averaged 2.2 million across its first two nights, with cross-platform counts affected by Nielsen’s expanded out-of-home and new Big Data + Panel methods and Adobe Analytics for NBC streaming.