‘Ted Lasso’ Tops Most-Streamed List – a First for Apple TV+ in 2023 | Charts

Apple TV+’s biggest hit, “Ted Lasso,” scored a big win at the top of the streaming charts in the latest Wrap Report for the week of April 26-May 2. This season’s seventh episode beat out several hot new programs, including Amazon Prime Video’s “The Citadel” and Disney+’s debut of “Peter Pan & Wendy,” and marked the first time ever that Apple TV+ landed the top spot on the leaderboard.

The Wrap Report tracks the most-watched programs across linear TV and streaming, according to viewership trends collected from Samba TV’s panel of more than 3 million households drawn from over 25 million connected TVs, balanced to the U.S. Census.

In an enviable second place this week, Disney brought one of its all-time classic animated films to life with “Peter Pan & Wendy.” Audiences who grew up with a VHS or DVD of the animated original seemed to be the most excited for the reimagined film and for a return to Neverland. Of the 762,000 households that streamed the movie on Disney+ during its opening weekend, Gen Z (ages 20-24) and older Millennial (ages 35-44) households overindexed relative to the rest of the country by 5% and 10%, respectively. Further indicating a strong launch for the film, “Peter Pan & Wendy” blew past other reimagined classics hitting the streamer, including “Cruella” by 52% in the same time frame.

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Rounding out the top three spots, Amazon Prime Video’s highly-anticipated premiere of “The Citadel” drew a sizable audience. The project starring Priyanka Chopra Jonas, “Game of Thrones” star Richard Madden and Stanley Tucci captures the allure of household Hollywood names coupled with action-oriented content. Initial viewership was strong compared to other recent Prime Video debuts, with 761,000 households tuning into the premiere during its first four days available to stream. More than eight in 10 of those who watched the debut episode continued to watch the second, demonstrating a strong start of initial engagement and stickiness for the show. The reach of the series right out the gate with diverse audiences may give the original series a boost. With Black and Asian households overindexing by strong double digits for the premiere, this trend spells another positive sign for Amazon’s video service.

French Netflix original action thriller film “AKA,” led by up-and-coming French star Alban Lenoir, became one of the streamer’s top trending movies this week. Netflix’s investment in international content continues to pay dividends for its global audience and appeared to resonate early with U.S. audiences as well, joining the leaderboard at No. 4.

In an ongoing effort to switch up its release model structure, Netflix recently debuted the second part of “Firefly Lane” Season 2, a seven-episode drop which concludes the series based on Kristin Hannah’s novel. Three of the episodes in the second season’s new batch were among the top 10, coming in at Nos. 5, 6 and 9 this week.

Meanwhile, audiences continue to seek out Netflix’s “The Diplomat.” The series premiere dropped to No. 8 but still managed to hang on to the charts as new viewers discovered the Keri Russell series. These households stuck with the show after the inaugural episode, with the second episode of the political thriller landing at No. 10.

After more than half a century of making audiences laugh, Carol Burnett still pulls in massive viewership, even surpassing that of many mainstay weekly broadcast programs, including ABC’s “American Idol” and NBC’s “The Voice.” The two-hour NBC program, “Carol Burnett: 90 Years of Laughter + Love,” honoring the comedy legend featured musical performances from stars including Bernadette Peters, Billy Porter, Jane Lynch, Katy Perry and Kristin Chenoweth as well as many celebrity guests. Even more impressive, a repeat airing of the special a mere four days later also nabbed a spot among the leaderboard, another achievement for Burnett.

ABC’s “American Idol” and NBC’s “The Voice” followed suit as the top 10 idols were whittled down to seven and Team Chance and Team Sheldon kicked off the playoff rounds, respectively.

Meanwhile, a trio of CBS programs — “NCIS,” “Young Sheldon” and “Survivor” — claimed their places on the charts.

Demand for action-packed movies from past years catapulted “Wonder Woman 1984” on TNT and NBC’s airing of “The Fate of the Furious” into the top linear programs for the week.

Dallas Lawrence is the SVP and head of communications and brand at Samba TV, a WrapPRO partner. Follow him on Twitter at @DallasLawrence. For more from Samba TV, click here.

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