"Jimmy Kimmel Live" passed a milestone last week, posting its best weekly ratings since shifting to the 11:35 p.m. timeslot in January.
During the week of June 10, the ABC late-night offering averaged 1.075 million viewers in the advertiser-sought 18-49 demographic — a 28 percent gain over the previous week, and a best-yet showing since the January shift, which put Kimmel's show in direct competition with NBC's "The Tonight Show" and CBS's "Late Show With David Letterman."
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The week's performance also marked Kimmel's best showing in the demo in nearly a decade, since the week of Nov. 24, 2003.
In total viewers, "Jimmy Kimmel Live" averaged 2.593 million for last week, a 13 percent gain over the previous week's average of 2.299 million.
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"Live" also posted its largest advantage over "Late Show With David Letterman" last week, besting the "Late Show" by a largest-ever 58 percent among the 18-49 crowd. (For the week of June 10, "Late Show" averaged 680,000 viewers in the demo, a 12 percent dip from the previous week. Letterman's total-viewer average for the week was 2.664 million, a one-percent gain over the previous week.)
Letterman did, however, beat out Kimmel in total viewers, for the week, averaging 2.664 million versus Kimmel's 2.593 million.
Last week's Tuesday-night edition of "Live" — featuring guests Lil Wayne, Chris Messina and Jimmy Eat World — performed particularly well, hitting a series high of 1.659 million in the demo.
NBC's "The Tonight Show With Jay Leno" still won the week overall, averaging 1.171 million viewers in the demo — a five percent increase over the previous week — and 3.8 million total viewers, a 6 percent uptick.