Super Bowl Ratings 2021: How Many People Watched The Buccaneers Beat The Chiefs?

Super Bowl LV wasn’t a very competitive game, and that fact is reflected in the television ratings. Fewer people watched the Tampa Bay Buccaneers beat the Kansas City Chiefs than any Super Bowl in the last 13 years.

A total of 96.4 million viewers tuned into Sunday’s game across all platforms, according to CBS. Viewership was down significantly from last year’s Super Bowl when nearly 104 million viewers saw Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs beat the San Francisco 49ers 31-20 in comeback fashion.

Tampa Bay defeated Kansas City 31-9 as Tom Brady won a record-setting seventh championship. The Bucs entered halftime with a 21-6 lead and were up by three scores for good midway through the third quarter. There were no points scored in the game’s final 17 minutes and 46 seconds.

CBS has clarified the broadcast deliveries for Super Bowl LV, saying that the traditional TV presentation averaged 91.6 million viewers. That tops Pittsburgh-Seattle in 2006 (90.7M) but is now the least-watched broadcast since Indy-Chicago averaged 93.2M on CBS in 2007.
— Anthony Crupi (@crupicrupicrupi) February 9, 2021

This game will be the most viewed U.S. telecast of 2021 by a long shot. The ratings drop of about 9% is in line with the regular season ratings drop of 7%. The NFL remains as the most powerful TV product in America.
— John Ourand (@Ourand_SBJ) February 9, 2021

Super Bowl LV was the least-watched Super Bowl since 2007. For that contest, 93.2 million people tuned in to see the Indianapolis Colts beat the Chicago Bears 29-17.

Just north of 100 million people watched Brady’s New England Patriots defeat the Los Angeles Rams two years ago in the lowest-scoring Super Bowl of all time. Every Super Bowl from 2010-2020 drew at least 100 million viewers.

Super Bowl XLIX remains the most-watched Super Bowl of all time with north of 115 million total viewers. It was Brady’s fourth title as the Patriots beat the Seattle Seahawks 28-24 in 2015.

Football fans in New England continued to support Brady, even in another uniform. Boston generated a 57.6 household rating (meaning 57.6% of the households with TVs in Boston were watching), putting it ahead of Tampa Bay’s 52.3 rating. However, Kansas City led all markets with a 59.9 Super Bowl LV rating.

Only 91.6 million people watched the 2021 Super Bowl on TV, according to Sportico. That’s the lowest number since the 2006 Super Bowl when 90.75 million viewers saw the Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Seattle Seahawks.

Super Bowl LV set a streaming record with an average minute audience of 5.7 million viewers watching online. Last year’s Super Bowl was streamed by 3.4 million people.