Though India lost the match, there was a new record for peak concurrency on television with 13.05 crore viewers tuning in at the same time.

Citing BARC India data, the broadcaster said that the tournament saw the viewership cross half a billion for the first time with 51.8 crore people tuning in to watch the matches on linear TV. Total consumption was 422 billion minutes, making it the biggest World Cup ever.

Talking about the viewership numbers, Sanjog Gupta, head of sports at Disney Star, told Mint that with more than 30 crore viewers, the final match was the biggest event in the history of Indian television. “The highest reach for any event before this match was clocked by the India – Pakistan match of the 2019 World Cup, which was around 25 crore. If you take the total tournament reach, it is also the highest ever for any World Cup.”

In terms of peak concurrency on TV, the final match surpassed the previous highest peak concurrency in the tournament with India Vs Pakistan at 7.5 crore and India Vs New Zealand at 8 crore.

“If you look at the reach, we have delivered the highest ever reach of not one or two but three marquee events this year on TV. Starting with the Indian Premier League (IPL), then the Asia Cup and now the ICC Cricket World Cup. All three touched new records on TV this year. Even if you look at the premium demographic, which is the Male 15+ AB audience in urban India, it has delivered the maximum growth of 11%. From 71 million in the 2019 World Cup to 79 million this time.”

The World Cup has attracted record viewers even on digital platforms, with the final match clocking the highest concurrency of 5.9 crore on Disney+Hotstar, a global record for any live sports event.

Even when the prospects of team India started declining, the concurrency hovered around the 4.5-4.7 crore mark, which was more than the peak concurrency delivered during the IPL this year on a rival platform.

“We have always maintained that the live sport is not about TV or digital but TV and digital. Sports broadcast is all about serving the fans the best possible product as they are at the front and centre of the event. This time also, both TV and digital had the highest viewership and peak concurrency, so there is no question about one eating into the other,” Gupta added.

Disney Star aired the World Cup with 11 feeds across nine languages.

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Updated: 23 Nov 2023, 06:16 PM IST