• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, 10 hours ago

A few years back, it seemed as if TV’s biggest annual awards shows were all in an irreversible viewership decline.

Viewership for all of the majors -- the Emmys, Grammys, Oscars and Tonys -- was down year-over-year for a few years, and the TV Blog beat this drum in a number of columns starting in 2021. 

That first one reported on the 2021 Golden Globes, whose audience cratered year-to-year, from 18.32 million total viewers in 2020 to 6.91 million in 2021. Then came blogs about the rest of the them.

Blogs about the remainder of the awards shows appeared from time to time, but when I read a story about the ratings for this past weekend’s MTV Video Music Awards, I decided to go back and take a look at the awards ratings.

Here’s a scorecard:

The Oscars hit a low point in 2021 with a total audience of 10.4 million -- a record low. 

Admittedly, 2020 was a low point for movie attendance because of the pandemic. As a result, interest in the Oscar nominees and winners that year was also at an all-time low.

The 2022 Oscars saw a nice increase to 16.6 million. The trend continued through the 2025 Oscars, which drew 19.69 million. This year’s show dipped to 17.86 million total viewers.

The Grammys hit the skids in 2021, nosediving to 9.23 million viewers after 18.7 million in 2020. 

The Grammys made a comeback, however -- 12.55 million in 2023 and 16.9 million in 2024.

This year, total viewership fell again to 14.41 million.

The Tony Awards have always been the smallest of the Big Four awards shows. This year’s telecast last June drew a very respectable 5.06 million total viewers, up from 4.85 million in 2025.

As for the Emmys, this year’s show earlier this month had a total audience of 6.8 million -- down from 7.59 million a year earlier.

The conclusion is that the declines have slowed a bit, but they are still here.

Photo credit: CBS, Madonna at the MTV Video Music Awards Sunday night.