• by Wayne Friedman , February 10, 2026

The first Super Bowl under Nielsen's new "Big Data + Panel" measurement posted its second-highest result for the big annual NFL sports event – 124.9 million average viewers.

The strongest Super Bowl result was a year ago --"Super Bowl LIX" -- between the Philadelphia Eagles and the Kansas City Chiefs, registering 127.7 million average viewers, on Fox Television Network and Tubi.

NBCUniversal’s NBC TV Network and its streamer Peacock (as well as Telemundo, NBC Sports Digital and NFL+) did earn a record when it came to a peak moment in the game during the second quarter, when it pulled in 137.8 million viewers.

In terms of Nielsen measurement TV/streaming viewing the “Apple Music Super Bowl LX Halftime Show” averaged 128.2 million viewers from 8:15-8:30 p.m. ET.

Looking at social media, the halftime show featuring musical artist Bad Bunny witnessed social consumption -- up 137% to a record four billion views, per Ripple Analytics, by way of NBCUniversal.

NBC says this measure is inclusive of fans, owned platforms, broadcast partners, and influencers.

NBC’s Telemundo posted a record 3.3 million average viewers, per Nielsen -- the best ever for a Spanish-language TV network.

On the same day as the Super Bowl, NBC’s airing that night of the second day of the “Milan Cortina Winter Olympics” earned 42 million viewers for its “Primetime in Milan” and “Milan Prime” primetime shows. This was the best second day of Winter Olympics airing since the second day of the 2014 Sochi Olympics.

Launched in September 2025, Nielsen’ Big Data+Panel measure started up in September 2025. New smart TV data and set-top box data (from Comcast, DirecTV, Dish, Roku, and Vizio) came from 45 million households and 75 million devices.

This added to Nielsen's long-time core panel of 42,000 homes (101,000 people).