There’s One Very Strange Inclusion In Ireland’s Most Watched Shows Of 2018

RTÉ has scored 40 spots on TAM Ireland’s Most Watched TV list for 2018, with a range of entertainment shows, dramas, comedies, documentaries, sporting fixtures and news and events.

The figures demonstrate that Irish audiences love to be entertained. The much-loved Late Late Toy Show topped the list again this year with an enormous audience of over 1.5 million and over 50% share tuning in to see Ryan Tubridy and a cast of hundreds bring the Greatest Show to their homes.

Room to Improve got a massive audience and strangely sees itself included in the top five.

Of course, it was no ordinary Room to Improve, a very special debut series episode in January scored an audience of 860,000 who watched as Daniel and Majella got the Dermot treatment at their Donegal house.

The Eurovision Song Contest with Ireland in the final for the first time in five years, featuring Ryan O’Shaughnessy flying the flag for proud viewers, had an audience on RTÉ One of 702,000.

And the Late Late Show makes another appearance in the Top 20, this time for its London special (642,000).

Comedy also features prominently for RTÉ in the list with the festive episodes of Mrs Brown’s Boys (689,000) and The Young Offenders (601,000) making an appearance.

Sport on RTÉ2 holds 19 places on the list, with the Guinness Series Ireland v New Zealand match watched by 927,000, the FIFA World Cup match Croatia v England watched by 924,000, and the All-Ireland finals (Sunday Game) Galway v Limerick (854,000) and Dublin v Tyrone (841,000) all appearing within the top ten.

Ireland v England and Ireland v Scotland on Virgin Media One also brought in massive viewed especially the former which saw Ireland win the Grand Slam against our neighbours on Paddy’s Day.

The highest-watched documentary of the year was the much-acclaimed RTÉ produced Whistleblower: The Maurice McCabe story with reporter Katie Hannon which had an audience of 637,000.

Other popular RTÉ documentaries were We Won the Lotto (478,000) and One Day: How Ireland Eats (474,000), a new series of which is currently on RTÉ One on Monday nights.

The RTÉ Six One News and Nine O’Clock News programmes achieved audiences of 808,000 and 707,000 on 1 March respectively, as Storm Emma raged across Ireland.

Adrian Lynch, Director of Audiences Channels and Marketing for RTÉ said:

“The TAM Ireland list clearly demonstrates how much Irish people love home produced, Irish content. We’re very proud to have delivered 40 out of 50 of the top viewed programmes across a wide range of shows and genres including entertainment, documentary, sport and news.”

Here’s the Top 15 most Watched shows in Ireland and how many people it pulled in:

1. The Late Late Toy Show (RTE One) 30/11/18 – 1.5m
2. Six Nations: England V Ireland (Virgin Media One) 17/03/2018 – 975,000
3. Guinness Series Live: Ireland V New Zealand (RTÉ2) 17/11/2018 – 926,000
4. 2018 FIFA World Cup: Croatia V England (RTÉ2) 11/07/2018 – 924,400
5. Room To Improve (RTÉ One) 18/02/2018 – 859,800
6. Sunday Game Live Galway V Limerick (All Ireland Hurling Final RTÉ2) 19/08/2018 – 854,400
7. Sunday Game Live Dublin V Tyrone (All Ireland Football Football Final RTÉ2) 02/09/2018 – 841,100
8. RTE News: Six One 01/03/2018 – 807,600
9. Six Nations: Ireland V Scotland (Virgin Media One) 10/03/2018 – 729,400
10. RTE News: Nine O’Clock 01/03/2018 – 707,400
11. Eurovision Song Contest Final 2018 (RTÉ One) 12/05/2018 – 701,900
12. Mrs Brown’s Boys – Exotic Mammy (RTÉ One) 25/12/2018 – 688,700
13. I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here (Virgin Media One) 18/11/2018 – 679,300
14. Six Nations: Ireland V Wales (Virgin Media One) 24/02/2018 – 663,300
15. 2018 FIFA World Cup Final: France V Croatia (RTÉ2) 15/07/2018 654,400

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