While the program took the seventh spot overall, almost half its metropolitan audience was in Sydney, where it was the No.1 show. This is no surprise, given Struggle Street was filmed in the western Sydney suburb of Mount Druitt and was the focus of much tabloid outrage.

Peta and Ashley Kennedy and their family in the SBS documentary Struggle Street.

Though Struggle Street was condemned by some as "poverty porn" before its broadcast, it drew widespread praise on social media after it aired.

In the five major cities alone, it attracted 935,000 viewers – putting it ahead of Nine's Reno Rumble on 791,000 and Seven's House Rules on 631,000. (Struggle Street's national audience of 1.31 million includes its 370,000 regional viewers. Full regional ratings for every other program are not yet available.)

It also smashed its direct rivals in the 8.30pm timeslot: ABC's The Weekly with Charlie Pickering (443,000) and The Agony Of .... Flirting (368,000); Seven's Criminal Minds (460,000); Nine's The Amazing '90s (530,000) and Ten's Wonderland (489,000).