Final 2011-12 Ratings: ABC Moves Up to Tie an NFL-Boosted NBC in Adults 18-49

Based on Nielsen's just-released final primetime ratings for the 2011-12 season to include all DVR playback (Live + 7 Day Program Ratings), ABC moved up to tie an NFL-boosted NBC in Adults 18-49 (2.5/7), despite the fact that NBC carried the record-setting 2012 Super Bowl and the top-rated "Sunday Night Football" package throughout the 4th Quarter. In fact, excluding just the Super Bowl from the numbers, ABC surpassed NBC by 9% for the season (2.5/7 vs. 2.3/7). Factoring out all sports programming from the season averages, ABC's advantage over NBC jumped to 25% (2.5/7 vs. 2.0/6). Overall, ABC outdrew NBC by more than 1 million viewers for the season (8.5 million vs. 7.4 million).

· ABC Holds All of its Young Adult Number Year to Year: ABC retained 100% of its Adult 18-49 rating delivery from last season and was up in 25% of the half-hours on its schedule.

· ABC is the Only Net Up in the 10pm Hour for the Season: On Monday-Friday from 10:00-11:00 p.m. as a lead-in to affiliates' late-local news, ABC delivered solid year-to-year improvement in Total Viewers (+7%), Adults 18-49 (+4%) and Adults 25-54 (+7%). In fact, ABC was the only net to grow in the key Adult 25-54 news demo.

· ABC Airs the Season's Highest-Rated TV Series: ABC aired the season's No. 1 scripted series/comedy ("Modern Family"), the No. 1 drama ("Grey's") and the No. 1 freshman drama ("Once Upon a Time" - TV's top rated new drama series in 4 years). In fact, it was the 2nd straight season for "Modern Family" to stand as TV's highest rated scripted show, while ABC delivered TV's No. 1 scripted series for the 6th time in the last 8 television seasons.

· ABC's Wednesday Night Comedy Block Grows for the 2nd Year in a Row: For the 2nd year in a row, ABC's Wednesday 8:00-10:00 p.m. comedy block grew year over year with Total Viewers (+3%) and Adults 18-49 (+9%). In fact on average during 2011-12, the Net wrapped up its top-rated Wednesday night performance in 5 years - since 2006-07.

Source: The Nielsen Company, National Live + 7 Day Program Ratings (9/19/11-5/23/12).