Soap Opera Ratings Race: DAYS Is Movin’ On Up!

The soap opera ratings race for the week ending February 16 shows Days of Our Lives (DOOL) continuing its rise, while other soaps played the up and down game.

Days of Our Lives
While DAYS remained in fourth place out of four soaps, it began creeping up on General Hospital, pulling in 2,280,000 viewers on average overall, down 249,000 from the week before, yet up 35,000 from the year before. In fact, DAYS was the only soap to make gains from the previous year.

But, the big news for the 52-year-old soap is its demographic ranking. After staying in the last place doldrums for years, DAYS was suddenly number two with women 18-49 and 18-34. In fact, it was the only soap to also make demo gains.

General Hospital
Third place General Hospital (GH) has DAYS right at its heels, garnering 2,428,000 viewers on average overall, down 257,000 from the prior week and 113,000 from the prior year.

The Young and the Restless
First place, The Young and the Restless (YR), pulled in 4,154,000 viewers on average overall, down 294,000 from the week before and 272,000 from the year before.

The Bold and the Beautiful
Sister soap The Bold and the Beautiful (BB) garnered 3,297,000 viewers on average overall, down 320,000 from the prior week and 489,000 from the prior year.

While these may seem like low numbers for February sweeps, all soaps were pre-empted in some part that week due to the Parkland, FL high school shooting. In addition, soaps didn’t seem to pull out their Feb. sweeps best this year, possibly because of Winter Olympic competition fear in some markets.

But, with the GH earthquake starting off March with a boom, it might come in like a lion and go out that way as well in the soap rating world.