Tuesday night was a big night for Jimmy Kimmel Live, which moved into its brand new, 11:35 p.m. ET timeslot, moving up from midnight to compete with David Letterman and Jay Leno’s late night talk shows. As it turns out, Kimmel’s show cleanly bested The Late Show with David Letterman, while falling a little short of the numbers The Tonight Show brought in.
Tuesday’s Nielsen ratings for the late night market show are stating that ABC and Kimmel brought in 3.1 million total viewers during the late night slot. This is more than Letterman and CBS, which pulled in 2.9 million total viewers, but less than NBC and Leno, which managed 3.3 million total viewers. Surprisingly, Deadline is reporting the very same thing happened with the 18-49 demographic. Leno landed a little over a million viewers, Kimmel nailed it with 887,000 and Letterman fell into third with 683,000 viewers.
As the numbers show, the three late night shows were actually really close, all things considered, during last night’s airing. What last night did prove is that Jimmy Kimmel Live can compete in an earlier timeslot. While Kimmel’s show did boast ratings-bringer Jennifer Aniston as a guest last night, even if he loses (or gains) a few viewers as the novelty of his new airtime wears off, it seems like his show will probably be in the same ballpark as the other late night veterans, although it’s definitely too early to say that with complete certainty.
You can catch Jimmy Kimmel Live in its new timeslot on ABC weeknights at 11:35 p.m. ET.
