Stranger Things 2 Has Huge Viewership, Nielsen Says

Ladies and gentlemen, can we please have your attention? We’ve just been handed an urgent and horrifying news story, and we need all of you to stop what you’re doing and read this.

Lots of people watched Stranger Things 2.

The TV ratings gurus over at Nielsen confirmed what was already obvious to the rest of us today, releasing viewership measurements that they mined from Netflix’s streaming video on demand (SVOD) data. The company revealed Thursday that a whopping 15.8 million people—nearly 11 million of them adults aged 18-49—watched Stranger Things 2’s first episode within three days of its launch on Oct. 27, and those numbers don’t even account for mobile viewers. By Nielsen’s standards, both of those figures are equivalent to traditional TV ratings data points, per THR.

On top of that, Nielsen says 361,000 Netflix subscribers streamed the entire nine-episode sequel season within 24 hours of its release. At least four million U.S. viewers have already watched Stranger Things 2 in its entirety. (That’s four million potential spoiler sources—tread lightly.)

Here’s how the individual episodes stack up in terms of viewership during the first three days:

“Chapter Two” — 13.7 million viewers; 9.6 million people 18-49
“Chapter Three” — 11.6 million viewers; 8.1 million viewers 18-49
“Chapter Four” — 9.3 million viewers; 6.6 million viewers 18-49
“Chapter Five” — 8 million viewers; 5.6 million viewers 18-49
“Chapter Six” — 6.4 million viewers; 4.5 million viewers 18-49
“Chapter Seven” — 5.3 million viewers; 3.7 million viewers 18-49
“Chapter Eight” — 4.9 million viewers; 3.4 million viewers 18-49
“Chapter Nine” — 4.6 million viewers; 3.2 million viewers 18-49

Netflix, naturally, has not authenticated Nielsen’s numbers, as they are wont to not do—the streamer would presumably prefer to let hype sway new subscribers, rather than cold, hard facts. Nielsen recently announced a service measuring SVOD viewership for Netflix, as well as NBCUniversal, Disney-ABC, A+E Networks, Lionsgate, Warner Bros. Television and others. The company’s Stranger Things 2 measurements are the first significant result of those efforts.

“Our approach is using the exact same framework and methodology that we do for all of television,” Brian Fuhrer, Nielsen’s senior VP of product leadership, recently told THR. “You can put these Netflix and broadcast numbers right next to one another and understand the relationship.”

Stranger Things 2 is now streaming on Netflix, obviously. So far, we’ve shared our thoughts on episodes one and two, episodes three and four, and episodes five and six. We like ‘em.