Gerry Turner, a retired restauranteur from Indiana, was dancing his way into a slew of dates on Thursday night’s opening episode of The Golden Bachelor.
The latest extension of the ABC dating franchise opened with 4.36 million viewers and a 0.62 rating in the 18-49 demographic, per Nielsen Live+Same Day national ratings.
Hosted by Jesse Palmer, the series comes from Warner Bros Unscripted Television and is exec produced by Andrew Frank, Bennett Graebner, Claire Freeland and Jason Ehrlich.
The number marked the biggest audience in the franchise since The Bachelor: After The Final Rose in March 2022 and delivered the strongest premiere for any series in the franchise since The Bachelor season premiere in 2021.
ABC said it also marked the most-watched debut for any unscripted series on any network in five months since the network’s own Jeopardy! Masters in May. The network highlighted that these numbers are expected to grow on delayed viewing with Hulu.
Earlier Friday, with the fast numbers, The Golden Bachelor beat out Big Brother with 4.1M viewers compared to the CBS show’s 2.7M and WAS marginally above the People’s Choice Country Awards on NBC, which got 4M in early numbers. Bachelor in Paradise got 2.1M viewers in the metric.