For the first time in the history of the National Football League, Amazon Prime Video broadcast an exclusive game on Black Friday between the New York Jets and Miami Dolphins. The company utilized various broadcast viewership verticals outside of the primary broadcast featuring play-by-play announcer Al Michaels, color commentator Kirk Herbstreit and sideline reporter Kaylee Hartung. A special edition of TNF Tonight took the air before the game, which was followed by an alternate broadcast from YouTube sports comedy group Dude Perfect. The day ended with a postgame concert from country music recording artist Garth Brooks, closing the day of a new tradition that Prime Video expects to continue over the years.
The contest averaged 9.61 million viewers on Friday afternoon, and while it outperformed all competing programming in afternoon and prime time across broadcast and cable television, it was the second-least watched Prime Video game this year (Panthers-Bears on 11/9/23 averaged 9.56 million viewers). Moreover, Sports Media Watch states that the game garnered a 4.0 rating, marking the streaming provider’s lowest-rated contest of the year. Within the P18-34 demographic, the game was No. 1 across dayparts on Friday with an average of 1.77 million viewers, 220% higher than the No. 2 program. Additionally, the game finished No. 1 on the day among persons ages 18 to 49, averaging 4.28 million viewers. Ratings in both these categories, however, were low-points on the year at 2.5 and 3.2, respectively.
Viewership for the game peaked at 11.18 million viewers between 5 and 5:15 p.m. EST, according to data from Nielsen Media Research. When combined with out-of-home (OOH), local station (OTA) and computer and mobile measurements, the game attained an average minute audience of 10.83 million viewers.
“Prime Video’s first Black Friday Football game welcomed meaningful successes across Amazon’s many touchpoints with fans and customers,” Jay Marine, vice president and global head of sports at Prime Video, said in a statement. “We’re beyond proud of this new tentpole event we’ve created with the NFL, and how so many parts of Amazon worked to create a fun and innovative production that surrounded football, family, shopping, food and music. We look forward to building this Black Friday game into one of America’s great annual sports traditions.”
Reports from various sources indicated that Prime Video was successful in selling its available advertising slots ahead of the NFL Black Friday game, reportedly pricing 30-second commercials at approximately $600,000. Next year’s matchup for the day after Thanksgiving has yet to be announced, but the intent of the NFL is to rotate the contest and grant another NFL market the chance to host the game, according to Hans Schroeder, NFL executive vice president of media distribution.
Amazon Prime Video will resume its Thursday Night Football broadcasts this week when the Seattle Seahawks visit the Dallas Cowboys at 8:15 p.m. EST/5:15 p.m. PST.
