CBC/Radio-Canada says its coverage of the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 on Friday was watched at least in part by more than 13.3 million Canadian viewers on CBC and Radio-Canada networks and broadcast partners TSN, Sportsnet and RDS, citing overnight audience data from Numeris.
In addition, 1.9 million streams were viewed across CBC/Radio-Canada’s digital platforms, including CBC Gem, ICI TOU.TV, CBC/Radio-Canada’s Paris 2024 websites (cbc.ca/paris2024 and radio-canada.ca/paris2024), the CBC Paris 2024 app for iOS and Android devices, and the Radio-Canada JO Paris 2024 app, CBC says, citing Adobe Analytics data. Audiences in Canada can stream the opening ceremony anytime on CBC Gem and IC TOU.TV.
A Saturday CBC press release says Canadians are also streaming more during Paris 2024, with total video hours streamed on CBC/Radio-Canada platforms triple what they were on the same day during Tokyo 2020, and 775,000 hours of content streamed.
“We’re delighted to have given Canadians the chance to experience the wonders of the Paris 2024 Opening Ceremony, and to be swept up in the emotions felt from one side of the world to the other. In keeping with our mandate as a public broadcaster, these Olympic Games are an opportunity for us to continue to bring together audiences from across the country, and to share the stories, the dreams and the triumphs of our athletes,” Catherine Tait, CEO and president of CBC/Radio-Canada, said in the press release.
CBC’s live afternoon broadcast of the opening ceremony on the River Seine was the most-watched program in Canada on Friday with an average audience of 1.3 million viewers, an increase of 30 per cent over the Tokyo 2020 Opening Ceremony (one million) and 36 per cent over Beijing 2022 (943,000), according to CBC’s release. Viewership peaked at 2:01 p.m. ET when 1.6 million viewers watched the introduction of Team Canada during the parade of athletes on the Seine, CBC says.
CBC’s encore primetime broadcast of the opening ceremony was the second most-watched program in Canada on Friday, with an average audience of 1.2 million viewers, CBC adds.
Looking at some of the CBC streaming trends for Paris 2024, digital streams of the live opening ceremony on CBC Gem increased by more than 100 per cent compared to Tokyo 2020 and by nearly 50 per cent compared to Beijing 2022.
Time spent on CBC Gem each day during Paris 2024, as of Saturday, has increased compared to the daily average during Tokyo 2020 (272 per cent increase) and Beijing 2022 (27 per cent increase), CBC says.
In addition, the total number of hours spent by audiences across all CBC digital platforms, again as of Saturday, is nearly double the daily average during Tokyo 2020 and an increase of nearly 10 per cent compared to the daily average for Beijing 2022.
Canadian viewers have been embracing connected TVs for Paris 2024, CBC says, with those devices accounting for 63 per cent of hours watched on CBC Gem. Connected TV viewing has increased by 273 per cent compared to Tokyo 2020 and by 120 per cent compared to Beijing 2022.
CBC’s Paris 2024 Opening Ceremony coverage was hosted by Bell Paris Prime Live’s Scott Russell and CBC News chief correspondent Adrienne Arsenault, as well as the CBC Toyota Olympic Games Primetime panel consisting of Andi Petrillo, Waneek Horn-Miller, Perdita Felicien and Craig McMorris.
The Paris 2024 Opening Ceremony was the largest in Olympic history and the first to be held outside a stadium. It featured 10,500 athletes representing 206 nations and 300,000 in-person spectators spanning a six-kilometre parade route and more than 94 boats on the River Seine.
The star-studded spectacle included legendary French footballer Zinedine Zidane and an all-star quartet of Olympians including Rafael Nadal, Serena Williams, Nadia Comaneci and Carl Lewis taking part in the Olympic torch relay. Incredible performances along the parade route by popular French and international artists included popstar Lada Gaga singing “Mon Truc en Plumes” as the opening act, and an epic finale by Canada’s Céline Dion performing “Hymne à l’amour” on the Eiffel Tower.
