ITV's festival viewing figures show marked improvement from 2018

ITV Racing's third year covering the Cheltenham Festival has yielded significantly increased viewing figures across the board from 2018.

Over the channel's 14 hours of coverage at this year's festival, the overall average viewing figure rose 18.5 per cent from last year to 993,000, while peak daily viewing numbers and overall share also saw positive rises.

Tuesday, Thursday and Friday of this year's festival saw what ITV said were the highest average viewing numbers since records began in 2003, while Thursday's average of 961,000 was the highest since the inauguration of the four-day meeting in 2005.

The news will be welcomed by the broadcaster after a 2018 festival that saw a four per cent drop in overall average viewing figures from 2017, and a 14 per cent drop in the peak audience tuning into watch the meeting's showcase, the Cheltenham Gold Cup.

This year's Gold Cup day numbers were far more favourable, with the coverage enjoying a 17 per cent share of television viewing and peaking at 1.64 million viewers – both vast improvements on 2018.

ITV's figures also underscored the general rise in the festival's viewership since the channel took over as British racing's lead broadcaster in 2017.

That year's festival, the last to be covered by Channel 4, generated an average of 574,000 viewers on Queen Mother Champion Chase day, a total dwarfed by the 873,000 pulled in by ITV on the same day this year.

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