Another sign of the growing popularity of Victor Wembanyama: The 2026 Western Conference Finals outdrew the 2025 NBA Finals.
The seven-game conference finals series between the Spurs and Thunder averaged 10.83 million viewers on NBC and Peacock, according to Nielsen and Adobe Analytics. The do-or-die Game 7 Saturday drew 15.9 million viewers, the most-watched conference finals game since 2016.
The total series viewership is about 5% above the 10.27 million for last year’s Finals on ABC and ESPN+, which was also a seven-game series that featured Oklahoma City, which triumphed over the Pacers. It was the least-watched NBA Finals since the 2007 Cavaliers vs. Spurs series that averaged 9.29 million viewers, excluding the COVID-19-impacted series in 2021 that drew 9.91 million between the Bucks and Suns.
Replacing Tyrese Haliburton and the Pacers with Wembanyama and the Spurs turned one of the least-watched Finals ever to the most-watched conference finals in 24 years. Each of the seven games drew at least 9 million viewers—a threshold breached by just one other playoff game this year: Game 7 of the first round between the Celtics and Sixers on NBC.
The return of NBC as an NBA media partner has also helped the league. The NBA delivered a 16% increase in regular season viewership, with NBC returning a 109% increase over comparable windows with the 2024-25 season. (It’s important to note that changes in Nielsen measurements have resulted in ratings increases across the board over the last year.)
