Competition was fierce among the competition shows on the Big 4 on Weds, but the big boys took a ratings hit

Kodi Lee took the big prize last night as the winner of America’s Got Talent’s 14th season, but there wasn’t much of a victory dance for the Simon Cowell show or NBC.

With a 1.5 rating among adults 18-49, AGT fell 29% from its Season 13 finisher of September 19, 2018 to hit an all-time finale low. While the 10.08 million who tuned Wednesday was not an all-time viewership finale low, the total sets of eyeballs were down 22% from the finale of Season 13.

Having said that, AGT and a primetime A Little Late With Lilly Singh (0.5, 2.52M) did deliver the Comcast-owned net a clear Wednesday win with a 1.1 in the key demo and 7.56 million viewers overall. Also, AGT scored a Season 14 Wednesday 18-49 high with the finale, bouncing up 25% from last week.

Yet a low is a low and not the way you want to go out.

On a night that saw nothing but repeats on ABC and Big Brother (1.0, 4.30M), down a tenth, the only original on CBS, AGT’s decline may be a sign of fatigue for the long-running series. Going into the launch of the fall season next week, the ratings drop is also another sign of the Nielsen normal that afflicts almost all of broadcast and cable today in linear viewing

As NBC made sure to point out this morning, the Wednesday airings of AGT this season have seen rises of 90% across Live+7 delayed viewing and digital, including encores.

Digital was no boon to the Season 10 end of Fox’s MasterChef (0.8, 3.24M) on Wednesday – at least not on social media. The triumph of Dorian Hunter on the Gordon Ramsay-dominated series became public a little earlier that the chef or the Murdoch-owned net may have like thanks to a Facebook leak last night.

Among the key demo, MasterChef flamed out with a 27% decrease from its Season 9 finale. With 3.13 million viewers, the cooking competition series was down 12% in terms of total audience from last year.

Over on the CW, 9 PM’s Hypnotize Me (0.1, 430,000) was no spellbinder with a 50% demo fall from its September 11 show.

BTW – the least watched AGT finale was Season 10. Just 9.54 million viewers tuned in that September 16, 2015 night.