The figures released by FIFA agency Infront’s research arm Sponsorship Intelligence, cover the first three days of play.
In the host country Germany, the ZDF coverage of the tournament's opening game featuring the host nation was watched by 20.13 million, a market share of 76 percent. It was the most viewed FIFA World Cup opening match in history of German television.
England's opening match against Paraguay reached 84 percent market share in the UK. A 12m audience watched BBC1’s coverage, which matched the average for England’s group stage games in 2002.
This rating does not include the out-of-home viewing television audience which was believed to run into several millions more.
In France, prior to the nation’s team 0-0 draw against Switzerland last night, the first three games broadcast on TF1 have shown much improved ratings on average than all the games in 2002 not featuring France.
Approximately 5.5m watched Holland beat Serbia-Montenegro on NL 2. This, a market share of 89.4 percent, was well over half more than tuned into the 2002 final.
In Poland, the audience for the game against Ecuador on TVP 1 surpassed the 2002 top television rating for 2002’s final.
Portugal’s efforts against Angola drew 2.9m viewers (a market share of 81 percent). This was over 30 percent higher than the top rated audience in 2002.
On Norway’s TV 2 England's game against Paraguay attracted a market share of 81 percent. Norway did not qualify for the finals.
Infront added: “At the moment, the assessment of the viewing patterns is based on “overnights” and audiences could be significantly higher once “out of home” viewing is added in to the total. This is likely to run at record levels for this FIFA World Cup, given the current public viewing trend and the effect of new media options.”
