Even without Alabama or Georgia, or any other Southeastern Conference team, the College Football Playoff ratings for tonight’s championship game is expected to hit near-record levels.
We can see the trend coming. In last week’s semifinals, Michigan’s 27-20 win against Alabama was the third-most watched semifinals game, getting 27. 2 million viewers and peaking at 32.8 million.
2024 CFP National Championship game info
- TV: ESPN
- Time: 7:30 p.m. ET
- Location: NRG Stadium – Houston
- Line: -4.5, Michigan Wolverines
- Point Total: 56.5 points
The only semifinals games that got more viewers were Ohio State’s 42-35 win against Alabama and Oregon’s 59-20 win against Florida State in 2014, the first season of the College Football Playoff.
With that in mind, we could be on our way to the most-watched or close to the most-watched title game ever, which was that 2014 game when Ohio State beat Oregon 42-20, which got 34.148 million viewers.
Viewer numbers for that Alabama-Michigan game but it in the Top 10 cable TV shows of all time. It was the most-watched non-NFL game since 2019.
How big could this year’s College Football Playoff ratings be?
Last year, the College Football Playoff ratings for the championship game was 17.2 million. This year’s could double that.
Here are the College Football Playoff championship games in order of largest TV audience:
| Game | Season | TV audience |
| Ohio State 42, Oregon 20 | 2014 | 34.2 million |
| Alabama 26, Georgia 23 (OT) | 2017 | 28.4 million |
| Alabama 45, Clemson 40 | 2015 | 26.2 million |
| LSU 42, Clemson 25 | 2019 | 25.6 million |
| Clemson 44, Alabama 16 | 2018 | 25.3 million |
| Clemson 35, Alabama 31 | 2016 | 25.3 million |
| Georgia 33, Alabama 18 | 2021 | 22.6 million |
| Alabama 52, Ohio State 24 | 2020 | 18.7 million |
| Georgia 65, TCU 7 | 2022 | 17.2 million |