WNBA Finals TV Ratings Grow in Game 2 Despite NFL Competition

The WNBA continues to smash viewership records despite Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever’s elimination nearly two weeks ago.

Game 2 of the Finals between the New York Liberty and Minnesota Lynx averaged 1.34 million viewers Sunday at 3 p.m. ET on ABC, the most-viewed WNBA Finals game in 23 years. It was also the second-most-watched WNBA game on ESPN networks, behind Game 3 of the 1998 Finals, a do-or-die elimination game between the Phoenix Mercury and Houston Comets.

The record-setting figure comes despite direct competition from the NFL’s Week 6 slate. The NFL has cannibalized some of the WNBA’s viewership throughout the 2024 playoffs, most notably in the first round when games that aired on Sundays drew fewer eyeballs than those on Tuesday and Wednesday when there were no NFL games on-air.

The first game of the 2024 Finals, an overtime thriller Thursday, averaged 1.14 million viewers on ESPN, which was the first Finals opener in history to pass one million viewers. 

The series is averaging 1.24 million viewers through two games, 82% more than last year’s Finals. The most-viewed game in last year’s series, which saw the Las Vegas Aces win their second consecutive title by beating the Liberty, was the series-clinching fourth game that averaged 889,000 viewers.

While WNBA viewership is up significantly compared to prior seasons, Caitlin Clark remains the league’s biggest draw. The two playoff games with Clark and the Indiana Fever averaged about 2.2 million viewers, while the league’s regular-season viewership on ESPN networks, which was filled with Fever games, averaged 1.19 million viewers, just below the current Finals average.