Who was the most-watched team of the 2025 college football regular season? Well, it depends on how you define "most watched."
No one draws a crowd like Ohio State. The Buckeyes played in three of the four most-watched games of the regular season: 18.4 million for their win over Michigan, 18.3 million for the first No. 1 vs. No. 2 Big Ten Championship ever, and 16.6 million for the opener against then-No. 1 Texas. The Michigan game was slightly down from the 2023 game in which both teams came in undefeated, but up nearly 50 percent from last year's upset; the Indiana game was the most-watched B1G championship ever; and the Texas game was the most-watched opening weekend game ever.
But on a week-to-week basis, viewers couldn't get enough of Alabama. The Crimson Tide made 10 appearances in the top 50 (reminder: they've only played 13 games so far), but even that doesn't tell the full story. Alabama actually made 10 appearances in the top 32; Alabama's 10th-largest audience was nearly 23 percent larger than Ohio State's fifth-largest. For what it's worth, the Alabama games on this list drew a combined 96.56 million viewers, Ohio State's six appearances drew 71 million.
Of course, audiences didn't just gobble up Alabama games. For the second year in a row, millions of people flipped over from GameDay to ABC at just after noon ET and then tucked their remote away for the rest of the day.
Georgia drew eight top-50 audiences, LSU and Oklahoma were close behind with seven. Every SEC school but Kentucky made at least one appearance in the top 50. In the Big Ten, eight of the league's 18 schools did not dent the top 50, and another four appeared only once.
In fact, the Big Ten and the SEC's television performances mirror what they portray on the field. The Big Ten is stronger at the top but lacks depth (only three teams finished with two games of Ohio State and Indiana at 9-0), while the SEC, with seven of its 16 teams finishing within a game of first place, may not take home the ultimate prize but its week-to-week drama is unmatched.
Appearances by program
10: Alabama
8: Georgia
7: LSU, Oklahoma
6: Ohio State
5: Texas
4: Ole Miss, Oregon, Texas A&M
3: Auburn, Florida, Indiana, Miami, Michigan, Missouri, Penn State
2: Florida State, Notre Dame, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vanderbilt
-- As expected, the ACC's viewership fell alongside the fortunes of Clemson and Florida State. The 2024 ACC champs did not crack the top 50 after losing to LSU on Labor Day weekend, while Florida State's lone appearances came against Alabama and Miami. The ACC title game between Virginia and Duke drew a dismal 3.9 million viewers. Miami-Florida State (in 38th place) was the only ACC conference game to make the list.
-- The most-watched regular season Big 12 game was Texas Tech at Utah, which drew 4.04 million viewers to Fox's "Big Noon" window on Sept. 20. In positive news, the BYU-Texas Tech Big 12 Championship was up 30 percent from last year's Arizona State-Iowa State game.
-- Notre Dame's status as a major TV player in 2025 died alongside their CFP chances with the Texas A&M loss. The Irish's losses to Miami and the Aggies both drew more than 6 million viewers, but no Notre Dame game made the list thereafter. (A Notre Dame-BYU Pop-Tarts Bowl, played in the mid-afternoon on a Saturday on ABC, would have approached the Alamo Bowl's 8 million mark for most-watched non-CFP bowl game.)
Appearances by conference:
SEC: 62
Big Ten: 24
ACC: 9
Big 12: 3
Notre Dame: 2
-- We wrote last year about what a poor business decision CBS made by refusing to pay up for the SEC's A package, then turning around and paying more money for the Big Ten's B package. But that deal looks downright shrewd compared to NBC. Both networks are paying a reported $350 million per year through 2029 for around 15 Big Ten games a year, and CBS actually performed quite well considering how the contract is stacked in Fox's favor. However, the only B1G on NBC game to make the list was Oregon at Penn State, which drew a strong 8.5 million opposite Alabama-Georgia. In a related story, NBC is reportedly looking to sell off rights to the 2026 Big Ten Championship.
-- Annual reminder that, despite college football on ABC performing quite well, the bulk of the College Football Playoff will be on ESPN. The people running this sport are very bad at their jobs.
-- Finally, it will be interesting to see what sort of viewership the two CFP opening-round games on TNT get. A year ago, TNT drew 6.6 million for SMU-Penn State in a standalone window at noon ET, while Clemson-Texas drew 8.9 million to TNT opposite the NFL and Tennessee-Ohio State drew 14.86 million to ABC at night, also up against the NFL. This year, ESPN kept Alabama-Oklahoma (Friday night) and Miami-Texas A&M (Saturday noon) to itself, while licensing Tulane-Ole Miss and James Madison-Oregon to TNT, opposite Eagles-Commanders and Packers-Bears on Fox. Six million viewers seems like an optimistic projection, particularly if the games aren't competitive.
Appearances by network:
ABC: 35
Fox: 6
CBS: 5
ESPN, NBC: 2
In all, 70 games reached the 4 million mark, and another three came within 30,000 of that number. That's up from 58 at this time a year ago. Forty-nine games reached 5 million, up from 39 last year, and the number of 10 million-plus audiences has grown from four, to six, to 13.
1. Ohio State-Michigan -- 18.4 million (Fox)
2. Indiana-Ohio State, Big Ten Championship -- 18.3 million (Fox)
3. Georgia-Alabama, SEC Championship -- 16.9 million (ABC)
4. Texas-Ohio State -- 16.6 million (Fox)
5. Texas A&M-Texas -- 13.04 million (ABC)
6. Georgia-Tennessee -- 12.58 million (ABC)
7. Alabama-Auburn -- 11.31 million (ABC)
8. Notre Dame-Miami -- 10.8 million (ABC)
9. Alabama-Florida State -- 10.66 million (ABC)
10. Oklahoma-Alabama -- 10.48 million (ABC)
11. LSU-Clemson -- 10.45 million (ABC)
12. Texas-Georgia -- 10.43 million (ABC)
13. Alabama-Georgia -- 10.42 million (ABC)
14. Ole Miss-Georgia -- 9.79 million (ABC)
15. Michigan-Oklahoma -- 9.67 million (ABC)
16. BYU-Texas Tech, Big 12 Championship -- 9 million (ABC)
17. Oklahoma-Texas -- 8.73 million (ABC)
18. Georgia-Georgia Tech -- 8.72 million (ABC)
19. Oregon-Penn State -- 8.5 million (NBC)
20. Tennessee-Alabama -- 8.01 million (ABC)
21. Alabama-South Carolina -- 7.84 million (ABC)
22. Georgia-Florida -- 7.79 million (ABC)
23. Florida-LSU -- 7.64 million (ABC)
24. LSU-Alabama -- 7.54 million (ABC)
25. Penn State-Ohio State -- 7.19 million (Fox)
26. Alabama-Missouri -- 6.99 million (ABC)
27. Texas A&M-LSU -- 6.76 million (ABC)
28. Georgia-Auburn -- 6.69 million (ABC)
28. LSU-Ole Miss -- 6.69 million (ABC)
30. Ole Miss-Oklahoma -- 6.55 million (ABC)
31. Florida-Miami -- 6.46 million (ABC)
32. Vanderbilt-Alabama -- 6.41 million (ABC)
33. LSU-Oklahoma -- 6.38 million (ABC)
34. Texas A&M-Notre Dame -- 6.12 million (NBC)
35. Auburn-Oklahoma -- 6.12 million (ABC)
36. TCU-North Carolina -- 6.07 million (ESPN)
37. Indiana-Penn State -- 6.03 million (Fox)
38. Miami-Florida State -- 6.03 million (ABC)
39. LSU-Vanderbilt -- 5.94 million (ABC)
40. Ohio State-Washington -- 5.23 million (CBS)
41. Arkansas-Texas -- 5.61 million (ABC)
42. Indiana-Oregon -- 5.59 million (CBS)
43. USC-Oregon -- 5.43 million (CBS)
44. Virginia Tech-South Carolina -- 5.43 million (ESPN)
45. Missouri-Oklahoma -- 5.37 million (ABC)
46. Oregon-Iowa -- 5.37 million (CBS)
47. Michigan-Nebraska -- 5.3 million (CBS)
48. Ohio State-Illinois -- 5.28 million (Fox)
49. Ole Miss-Mississippi State -- 5.23 million (ABC)
50. Texas A&M-Missouri -- 4.87 million (ABC)
We'll be back in January with the 100 most-watched games of the entire 2025 season.