The Kansas City Chiefs’ conference-championship victory over the Baltimore Ravens on Sunday brought in the biggest AFC Championship viewership of all-time, CBS Sports announced.
An average of more than 55 million viewers tuned in to watch the game, peaking at more than 64 million.
The record-breaking numbers could be attributed to a few things, with a new gridiron fan base hoping to get a glimpse of Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce and his girlfriend Taylor Swift watching from a luxury box in Baltimore.
The Kelce-Swift relationship has spiked television ratings for Chiefs games throughout the season, including more than 50 million tuning in for last weeks’ Kansas City victory over the Buffalo Bills.
CBS streaming service Paramount+ had its most streamed live event ever for the second straight week with consecutive Chiefs games.
Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs beat the Ravens on Sunday in front of a massive TV audience
An average of more than 55 million viewers tuned in to watch Patrick Mahomes and co
The postseason across all rounds averaged 38.5 million viewers (pictured Lions vs 49ers)
CBS’ overall average viewership for the postseason of 45.6 million is its highest since 1998, when playoff football started its current run of airing on the network.
Meanwhile, the NFL announced that the postseason across the Wild Card, Divisional and Conference Championship rounds averaged 38.5 million viewers, making it the most-watched playoffs ever – nine percent up from last year.
In total, 120.4 million viewers tuned in for Championship Sunday – the highest total unduplicated audience since 2016-17.
Baltimore vs Kansas City was the most-watched non-Super Bowl program on CBS in 30 years, since the 1994 Winter Olympics aired on primetime.
The previous record for an NFL conference championship game was the January 2011 AFC Championship between the Steelers and Jets, garnering 54.85 million viewers. Pittsburgh would go on to lose Super Bowl XLV to Green Bay.
The network will air Super Bowl LVIII on February 11, with CBS Sports chairman Sean McManus expecting more than 100 million viewers for the game.
Last year’s Chiefs-Eagles Super Bowl was the most-watched ever with an average of 115.1 million viewers.