Thursday Night Football has now set a record for its week on two Thursdays in a row. Seahawks-Broncos on Oct. 15 averaged 16.26 million viewers on Prime Video, including the local over-the-air simulcasts in Seattle and Denver, the most-watched Week 6 edition of the package on record. Sports Media Watch’s Jon Lewis reported the figure early on Tuesday, Oct. 20.
That edges the previous Week 6 high, Eagles-Giants last season at 16.09 million, by about 1 percent. It follows Buccaneers-Cowboys, which set the Week 5 record at 16.73 million a week earlier.
BRONCOS WIN IT IN OVERTIME https://t.co/wDBCmTltgY
— NFL (@NFL) October 16, 2026
A record that is also the season low
The number comes with a twist: it is the smallest Thursday audience of the 2026 season so far. The game, a 17-14 Denver win in overtime sealed by Ja’Quan McMillian’s interception and Wil Lutz’s 53-yard field goal, went head to head with Game 4 of the Brewers-Dodgers National League Championship Series, the game that sent Milwaukee to the World Series. That baseball game drew 6.36 million viewers.
Last year’s Week 6 Thursday game had far easier competition, a Blue Jays-Mariners playoff game that drew just under three million. The Seahawks-Broncos audience still peaked at 18.34 million in the 9 p.m. ET quarter-hour.
Five for five on increases
Through five games, Thursday nights are averaging 17.29 million viewers, up 9 percent from the same point last season and the series’ best five-game start since 2015, when the package was split between broadcast and cable television and averaged 17.64 million. Every one of the five Thursday games has drawn more viewers than its equivalent from last year, which makes Thursday night the only one of the league’s TV packages without a single decline so far this season.
The usual measurement caveats apply. Out-of-home viewing was only partly counted before 2020 and was not fully included until 2025, this is only the second season of Nielsen’s Big Data method that adds smart-TV and set-top box data to its panel, and Nielsen recently changed how it counts groups watching together. Lewis noted that a 2019 Giants-Patriots game, which averaged 16.00 million, would almost certainly rank higher under today’s rules.
Next up: Patriots at Bears
The streak gets its next test on Thursday, Oct. 22, when two 4-2 teams meet as the Patriots visit the Bears to open Week 7. Kickoff is 8:15 p.m. ET, which is 3:15 a.m. Friday in Cairo. With the baseball playoffs moving to the World Series, the next Thursday game should have less competition for viewers.
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