Andor Ends with a Bang
The weekly Nielsen Streaming Ratings are in, and Disney+ executives are smiling from ear to ear.
For the first time in ages, a non-Bluey show on the streaming service was the most popular program in the world.
Wall Street Journal
Andor ended its run with a bang, winning the week on streaming. Here’s what just happened.
Andor Ascendant
Photographer: Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images
Streaming ratings results are easy to understand and even easier to track.
When a television series has a good season, its ratings increase from week to week.
Photo: Hulu
Obviously, this statement presumes that the show program airs weekly rather than releasing the entire season of content at once.
Disney’s various streaming services vacillate between several different release strategies.
Photo: Hulu
As an example, The Bear will air the entirety of its fourth season on Hulu on June 25th. Don’t bother texting me that day. I’m turning my phone off.
Other programs like The Handmaid’s Tale stream an episode or two as a season premiere. Then, the rest of the new episodes stream weekly.
Photo: Harper’s Bazaar
Andor adopted a unique approach, as its second and final season told a quartet of stories.
Writer/director Tony Gilroy broke the full season into four story arcs, and Disney+ executives did right by the premise.
Charles Sykes/Invision/AP/Shutterstock
Rather than greedily stretching the entire season out across 12 weeks, Disney+ unveiled Andor season two in a single month.
For a series of four consecutive weeks, Disney+ streamed three new episodes of Andor season two.
Photo: NME
I’ve tracked the show’s performance with *ahem* understated headlines like “Andor is an absolute blockbuster.”
For the ratings chart two weeks before that, I mentioned that “Andor keeps going up”.
Photo: Getty Images/Ringer illustration
That’s the phenomenon that we’re discussing here. Since Andor employs such a unique release pattern, Disney+ took a risk.
The Dangers of This Release Pattern
Photo: English Jargon
By releasing the season across four weeks, Disney+ gambled that fans would enjoy the series and stick with it.
MANY streaming series have received shocking, seemingly out-of-nowhere cancellations due to this release pattern.
The Last of Us
Others like The Last of Us have lost tons of momentum as fans have soured on the story.
If you’ve watched season two of The Last of Us, you understand why, but that’s not the point.
Photo:cnet.com
Services are banking on the quality of a season to sustain interest, and we can tell their success via the ratings.
When a show’s ratings decline or, even worse, tank, we can conclude that its quality wasn’t up to snuff.
Breaking Bad
Conversely, when a show pulls a Breaking Bad – that’s legitimately what I call it – you know that the season has been a triumph.
In September 2013, millions of people discovered Breaking Bad just as the series finale was approaching.
Disney
The show became an overnight sensation during the final few weeks of its existence, a tribute to its spectacular quality.
Something similar has happened with Andor, which, as I mentioned, has won the week on the Nielsen Streaming Charts.
Let’s Talk Numbers
Disney
Andor’s first three episodes of season two earned 721 million viewer minutes.
Then, the Star Wars series increased to 821 million viewer minutes, and then, most recently, 830 million viewer minutes.
Photo: Lucasfilm
Now, we have the show’s ratings for its final three episodes of the season, and they’re, well, epic.
Andor soared to 931 million viewer minutes, one of the best totals for a non-Bluey original series on Disney+ in ages.
Photo: Marvel
For comparison, the season finale of Agatha All Along managed 744 million viewer minutes, and I considered that total exceptional.
Loki season two, another example of a high-quality program elevating its ratings throughout its run, earned 753 million viewer minutes.
So, you can tell by this data that Andor just did something incredible here.
This is the rare win that Disney+ has longed for. While Hulu is ascending, original programming on Disney+ has struggled mightily.
Photo: Lucasfilm
A hit like this goes a long way in preventing churn, a topic I discussed in detail the other day.
Andor will be remembered as one of the high points of 2025 on Disney+.
Disney’s Other Streaming Hits
Image: The Wall Street Journal
As usual, Disney gained several spots on the Nielsen Streaming Charts for the week of May 12th – 18th.
In fact, in a rarity, Disney+ claimed the top two titles overall, with Bluey finishing in second with 922 million viewer minutes.
Photo: Bluey.tv
So, this was an epic week for Disney+. Also, while I haven’t said it as much this year as last, Bluey is on pace to be the number one streaming program in 2025.
That’s an accomplishment Bluey managed in 2024…but I don’t think it will repeat in 2025.
Photo: Ludo Studios
I know I just said it’s ahead, but the series finales of Stranger Things and Squid Games will occur later this year. They’ll be all but impossible to beat.
Still, Bluey continues to be an absolute juggernaut on streaming, and I suspect this franchise will stand the test of time.
Photo: Disney
Here are the other Disney streaming hits for the week in question:
- Grey’s Anatomy – 810 million viewer minutes
- Criminal Minds – 787 million viewer minutes
- The Rookie – 696 million viewer minutes
- The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives – 680 million viewer minutes
- NCIS – 657 million viewer minutes
- Law & Order: SVU – 592 million viewer minutes
- Family – 533 million viewer minutes
- The Handmaid’s Tale – 491 million viewer minutes
- Moana 2 – 238 million viewer minutes
- Rogue One: A Star Wars Story – 179 million viewer minutes
Families Streaming Disney+
So, Disney claimed 12 out of 30 total spots on the Nielsen Streaming Charts, including the top two.
Oh, and Andor proved so wildly successful that a bunch of people re-watched Rogue One right afterward. Now THAT is a blockbuster performance!
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Feature Photo: Disney/Lucasfilm
