Why is There a Record Low Viewership for This Year’s NBA Finals?

This year, the NBA Playoffs themselves have been some of the most fun basketball to watch in years. With multiple series going to six or seven games, a plethora of close matchups, and even an added focus on defense and physicality, something fans of the NBA have been asking for desperately, one would think that maybe, just maybe, these results would translate to high viewership for the NBA Finals. It seems that has not been the case. The first game of this year’s finals averaged 8.91 million viewers, making it the third least-watched opener since 1988 and only ahead of the 2020 and 2021 NBA Finals, both of which were impacted by COVID-19.

For comparison, last season’s opener for the NBA Finals between the Boston Celtics and the Dallas Mavericks averaged 11.31 million viewers. As if this wasn’t bad enough, the viewership for Game Two of this year’s Pacers-Thunder series was even lower, only averaging 8.76 million viewers. This is down 29% from Game Two from last year’s Finals, which averaged 12.31 million, making this year’s Game Two the least watched Game Two of the NBA Finals since the 2020 bubble series with the Heat and the Lakers. It is also worth noting that many American viewers were also preoccupied by the hospitalization of then-President Donald Trump during Game Two of the 2020 Finals because the president had COVID-19.

Given that the Pacers and Thunder are from smaller markets, with Indianapolis being the 25th largest market and Oklahoma City being the 47th largest, we knew entering this series that the Thunder and Pacers weren’t going to draw as much attraction in the NBA Finals as teams such as the Lakers, Celtics, Knicks, or Warriors might give how much larger these markets are, but these numbers are still shocking. However, while these numbers aren’t what the NBA or its fans want, the statistics aren’t all bad. In Game One, almost half of all 18-to-34-year-olds who were watching TV that night were tuned in to the NBA Finals. Coinciding with this, Game One also drew more than 500 million views across social media, which is an all-time record. This second stat in particular is very telling. Maybe the actual broadcast is losing viewers, but if highlights, reels, game clips, etc, are still being viewed by tens of millions of people, then perhaps the low viewership isn’t as bad as we thought, just that the medium for viewing the game has changed. All in all, while the viewership for this year’s NBA Finals has been much lower than last year, and historically low for that matter, high viewership and engagement on social media may tell another story.