Mr Bates vs the Post Office is ITV’s biggest new drama in over a decade, beating even the launch of previous record holder, the global costume drama phenomenon Downton Abbey which drew 7.6m for its debut on September 26, 2010, albeit in the days before streaming was factored into final viewing figures.
The ITV Studios and Little Gem series has now averaged 9.8m viewers across its four episodes, including seven-day viewing across all devices plus pre-TX viewing.
Including post-seven day viewing, the first three episodes have now all been watched by over 10.6m viewers, with the launch currently averaging 10.9m after ten days of catch up.
The full series, including the associated hour-long documentary, has had 16.6m streams so far on ITVX.
It is the biggest drama across all UK channels since Line of Duty S6 on BBC One in 2021, and the biggest new drama across all channels since Bodyguard on BBC One in 2018.
And it is ITV’s biggest drama since Broadchurch in 2017.
The four episodes are the most watched programmes on any channel so far this year.
Mr Bates vs. the Post Office is distributed internationally by ITV Studios.
