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The Arnold Palmer Invitational is one of the most popular tournaments on the PGA Tour calendar and the 2024 edition was no exception. However, it wasn't all good news for the Bay Hill event, as the final round of the tournament reported a notable drop in viewership.
Sports Business Journal reporter Josh Carpenter reported this Tuesday, March 12, on his X (formerly Twitter) account that the audience to watch Scottie Scheffler's victory at the Arnold Palmer Invitational via NBC's broadcast reached 2.291 million users, down 30% from the previous year.
The same reporter reported that Kurt Kitayama's 2023 victory reached 3.259 million viewers. This figure, in turn, was much higher than the 2.825 million who watched Scheffler's itself win the Arnold Palmer Invitational in 2022.
The data provided by The Sports Business Journal reporter indicates that only one tournament in the 2024 PGA Tour season has reported an increase in viewership over the previous year. That was The American Express, won by Nick Dunlap.
GolfWRX journalist Max Vincenzi, for his part, reported that, according to Sports Media Watch, the third round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational also suffered a drop in viewership. The average number of viewers was 1.76 million on NBC, 21% less than the previous season.
Arnold Palmer Invitational vs. LIV Golf Hong Kong
Sports Media Watch data shows that 208,000 viewers watched the final round of LIV Golf Hong Kong on the CW network's signal. The figure was 148,000 on Saturday, while no broadcast was reported on Saturday.
This was the first edition of LIV Golf Hong Kong, so there is no data from the previous season for comparison. However, the previous event on the same circuit (LIV Golf Jeddah) had an audience on Saturday, March 3 of 221,000 viewers, while on Sunday it was 195,000, in both cases on CW.
The last weekend, the total viewership numbers were much higher for the PGA Tour event, but it wasn't the same in terms of ratings. The Palmer Invitational had a rating of 1.1 on Saturday and 0.9 on Sunday, while the LIV Golf (Hong Kong) tournament reported 0.11 on Saturday and 0.12 on Sunday.
