The milestone 50th edition of Survivor pulled in solid ratings numbers Wednesday night — as did another show that debuted in the early 2000s, ABC’s revival of Scrubs.
The supersized Survivor 50 premiere averaged 5.06 million viewers over its three hours. That’s the biggest same-day audience for Survivor episode since the penultimate episode of season 45 in December 2023. The show also delivered CBS’ best Wednesday night performance since May 2022’s season 42 finale of Survivor.
The premiere also posted a 0.95 rating among adults 18-49 (equivalent to about 1.29 million people in that age range) — the best night one showing for Survivor since November 2021 — and a 1.22 rating among adults 25-54 (about 1.53 million viewers in that demo). Both figures led primetime on Wednesday.
Scrubs premiered with two episodes on ABC Wednesday, with the revived series airing its first episodes since 2010. The debut episode pulled in 4.41 million viewers and a 0.66 rating in the 18-49 demographic; the latter is the best same-day mark for any network comedy in its regular time period so far this season (i.e., excluding post-NFL premieres for NBC’s The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins and Fox’s Animal Control). The second episode averaged 3.52 million viewers and a 0.55 rating among adults 18-49. ABC reran the two episodes in the 10 p.m. hour, where they averaged 1.32 million viewers.
Following Scrubs, ABC premiered the Nate Bargatze-hosted game show The Greatest Average American. It drew 2.38 million viewers and a 0.27 rating in the 18-49 demo, improving on The Golden Bachelor’s averages in the same spot last fall.
