Well it was probably too good to be true, Netflix will be releasing annual reports from Q1 2027 (i.e. they’ve had a slump) so let’s appreciate these numbers whilst we can. You can download the latest set here.

Top performer of the 2026 intake is Bridgerton S4, a total of 889.8m hrs and an effective viewership (i.e. hours watched divded by runtime) of 100.2m people, although the show with the highest effective viewership was His & Hers with 104m viewers. As ussual we’ll delve into the competitive unscripted and of interest pile – these are raw numbers, shows released towards the end of the period will have a shorter sampling time than those that have had the full six months.

Unlocked: A Jail Experiment S2 7/1/26 32.7m hrs, 5.5m viewers
Love Is Blind Germany S2 8/1/26 32m, 3.4m
Kill Tony: Once Upon A Time In Texas 12/1/26 6.4m, 2.8m
Single’s Inferno S5 20/1/26 167.3m, 10m
Star Search: Episodes start at 3.8m, 2.6m viewers and then falls off to well under a million viewers quickly – The Final did 600k.
Skyscraper Live 24/1/26 24.4m 12.6m
Is It Cake? Valentines S1 4/2/26 6.2m, 8.3m
Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model 16/2/26 62.4m, 22.4m
Agents of Mystery S2 27/2/26 11.0m, 1.5m
Love Is Blind Sweden S3 12/3/26 28.7m, 2.3m
Temptation Island S2 10/4/26 58.3m, 6.7m
Million Dollar Secret S2 15/4/26 58.2m, 7.5m
Funny AF With Kevin Hart – starts 8m+ viewers, live Finale 3.7m viewers
Love is Blind Poland S1 6/5/26 37.4m, 3.3m
Pop Culture Jeopardy 11/5/26 5.7m, 600k
Outlast: The Jungle S1 10/6/26 58.1m, 8.1m
Lock Upp S1 27/6/26 6.7m, 1.5m
Love Is Blind: Argentina S2 28/6/26 1.0m, 300k

I’ve almost certainly missed things of interest so if you can think of something to add let me know.

What have we learned? Nothing has really jumped out numbers wise these first six months outside of Single’s Inferno. Pop Culture Jeopardy as expected from a daily quiz, even with Jeopardy‘s mighty brand behind it a bit of a bomb – lower than What’s In The Box, lower than Cheat with Danny Dyer. Not great. Netflix’s reality TV industry docs continue to do well. Their foray into live stuff has been extremely variable – difficult to suggest Star Search is a hit really even if it started off pretty well, but Funny AF With Kevin Hart, even if it didn’t main its initial interest, still did business throughout. Almost 13m people watched Skyscraper Live, although how much of that was live I don’t know. Million Dollar Secret is down about 20% on its first series but it’s still at a decent level (in terms of viewership hours it’s just above where Battle Camp was when it got cancelled, but it’s effective viewership is still quite a bit higher). It’s actually been almost two years since the last series of Outlast, it’s been rewarded with 10m extra hours over that series’ initial numbers.

Taking a look at stuff that was released towards the end of last year, What’s In The Box? added added another 7.8m hours taking it to 17.1m hours, which you can’t really suggest is good but is probably Netflix’s best performing quiz. Culinary Class Wars S2 needn’t have worried, it’s added a further 139m hours to add to the 88m it got in the last fortnight of last year. Simon Cowell: The Next Act added 11.4m hours to take it to 30.7m hrs, again not really a hit, but maybe not a bomb either. Squid Game: The Challenge S2 only added a further 11.3m hrs to go to 68m – as we said last time, decent numbers by general standards but a humungous drop by it own standard. Physical Asia over the 150m mark – will be very interesting to see how all the upcoming localised versions do.

If you want to see what things have done in total between 2023 and 2026, Netflix now have a searchable database.

Unofficial ranking of Netflix quiz shows:

1) What’s In The Box? 17.1m hrs, 3.8m viewers (effective)
2) Bullsh*t: The Game Show 13.1m hrs, 2.4m viewers
3) Cheat 8m hrs, 1.1m viewers
4) Pop Culture Jeopardy 5.7m hrs, 600k viewers

Bless them for trying though.

Tonight at 8:35pm before the England vs Norway match they’re showing a ten-minute preview of upcoming Saturday night reality show The Box with Gary Lineker, to give everyone a chance to write it off early presumably. Boxsen is in fact a Norwegian format so that is some fun synergy they’re probably not going to mention.

I’ve seen a bit of Boxsen and it’s… fine – celebs doing a variety of physical and mental tasks, the idea being they’ve got to figure out what needs doing and quickly get on with it, sometimes the situations they find themselves in are surprising (on top of a tower! In the middle of an ice hockey game!). Like every new Next Big Thing show I struggle to see it being the next big thing – it’s had some success in other Scandinavian countries but done rather less well in Benelux countries I understand. What NTA Best Host Gary Lineker is going to bring to proceedings I don’t know.

Edit: Also a repeat before France vs Spain coverage on Tuesday just before 7pm. About an hour before the game actually starts.

The Button liiiiiiivvveess.

Obviously we’re discussing this in the Discord, but as they’re uploading them to Youtube might as well have a chat here. The changes are good – Cyril Feraud brings energy as host (perhaps a bit too much, he seemed to make more noise outside of the cells than the team), pleasingly it feels like they’ve stopped being scared of their own format, it feels more like a gameshow again with rules and things that happen and good things and jeopardy rather than a sort of variety show where celebrities do things for two hours but not much of that is really consequential as it gets to the same end point anyway it seemed to become. I like the remixed theme music and graphical packages, although I think the games lack the musical identity they ought to have. The “Highlights” to earn bonus cash are fun, decent events to incorporate existing characters in meaningful ways, although I hope they have more than one game planned for the Thermal Baths and the Collective Adventure. Even the Council, usually a pretty boring bit, feels fun and meaningful. And it’s lean – most of the between game sketches (and the pre-cell rules!) have gone, and we don’t get a menu of adventures any more so they’re a surprise again, which is good!

First episode got the show’s best overnight in five years – much of that will be people tuning in just to see what it’s like, and I haven’t paid much attention to see if there are any real draws in future celeb bookings. Still though, you have to suggest pretty decent changes for a show in its 37th season.

Edit: Video swapped to international version with English subs.

From the Discord, extremely sad to hear about the passing of Chatsworth TV producer Malcolm Heyworth – what kid in the 80s and 90s wasn’t watching Treasure Hunt, The Crystal Maze, Interceptor et al? It was always this sort of thing that made me excited about the genre, and without which I wouldn’t still be writing about it 30+ years later.