Despite airing one of the more entertaining merge episodes in the show’s history, Survivor ratings for Ghost Island episode 8 reached a Malololow.
Usually, based on the regular television sweeps periods of US television, the final third slate of a Survivor season gets the highest ratings. People are either ardent watchers each week or want to catch up on the season in the final weeks before the finale is close to airing (to avoid spoilers). That puts the merge in a weird spot, as typically the ratings are on the lower side. Survivor Ghost Island’s merge episode, however, dropped to its lowest point in 2018.
TVByTheNumbers has posted the final ratings for Wednesday night, revealing that viewership reached not only a season low but did not reach the eight million mark at all. 7.97 million watched The Noble One both earn a Hidden Immunity Idol and instantly lose it after getting voted out, which is quite a bummer considering just how excellent the episode was.
Not only that, but the 1.6/7 ratings/share split for that key 18-49 adult demographic represents the lowest mark of the season for the Survivor ratings. It mostly sat at 1.7 and jumped up to 1.8 a few episodes ago, but the merge was even lower at 1.5 in its initial showing before adjusting up a tick with the final numbers.
Survivor ratings have slowly declined since it first aired in the year 2000, but this recent dip for Survivor Ghost Island shouldn’t worry fans of the series. Last year, Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers reached a 1.4./5 ratings/share split on episode 9, “Fear of the Unknown,” with just 7.42 million viewers tuning in. However, up until that episode, the season was mostly boring and didn’t heat up until the Final Four alliance formed at Lauren’s reward in the following two-hour episode.
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For Survivor Ghost Island, the ratings are always going to be good enough to secure a prolonged interest in the show. Still, with Chris Noble leaving the game, the number of entertaining personalities drops to a small handful out of 12 contestants remaining. We’ll have to see if that affects things going forward.