Fox’s “Sleepy Hollow” has become the first of this fall’s batch of new network television shows to be renewed for a second season.

The order for a second season came on Thursday after only three episodes had been televised. The show’s ratings earned it a vote of confidence: the premiere, on Sept. 16, one week before the formal start of the fall season, attracted 13.6 million viewers and scored a 5.0 rating among 18- to 49-year-olds, enough for Fox to call it, in a news release, the network’s “most successful fall drama premiere since the debut of ‘24’ in November 2001.”

Those viewer totals included three days of digital video recorder playback; once further DVR plays and online streams were tallied, the premiere recorded more than 22 million viewers, according to Fox.

The numbers have held up relatively well through the third week of the “Sleepy Hollow” season, which spans 13 weeks, about 10 shorter than a typical network drama but normal for Fox’s competitors on cable. By ordering a second season, instead of tacking on more episodes to the first, Fox is hewing to its belief in a shorter-season strategy.