April 25, 2015 - 1:21 PM
NEW YORK, N.Y. - Former Olympian Bruce Jenner reached an audience of just under 17 million people for his declaration in an ABC News interview that he identifies as a woman.
The Nielsen company said Saturday 16.9 million viewers watched the interview on ABC's "20/20" newscast Friday night.
The audience was the biggest for a non-sports show on a Friday night since 2003, which would exclude Olympics broadcasts. Friday is generally a light night for television viewing because so many people have plans outside the house.
It was also the biggest audience for ABC's "20/20" newscast on a Friday night in 15 years. Nielsen said viewership peaked just after 10 p.m. with 17.2 million viewers.
Nielsen Social also estimated that there were 972,000 tweets sent Friday night about the Jenner interview.
News from © The Associated Press, 2015