Olympics viewer stats: By the numbers

TORONTO – It started with the Queen and James Bond playfully leaping out of a helicopter and ended with a star spangled bang that included the Spice Girls and The Who. Pair those opening and closing Olympic ceremony acts with the world’s best athletes, and it’s no wonder the London 2012 Games brought in record breaking numbers for broadcasters around the world.

London 2012 was the “most-watched television event in US history,” according to NBC, which shelled out $1.18 billion for the exclusive US broadcast rights to the Games.

Canada’s Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium says that about 7.5 million Canadians tuned in to watch the closing ceremonies, while the nation saw a total of 662 million hours of coverage throughout the Games.

Take a look at how many eyes were glued to their television screen worldwide during the Summer Games.

7.5 million – The number of Canadians who watched the Olympic Games closing ceremony, making the event the most-watched Summer Olympics broadcast on record in Canada

662 million – the number of hours Canadians collectively watched of Olympic coverage through the 2012 Games

21 hours – the number of hours each Canadian viewer watched of Games coverage, on average

88 per cent – how much viewership increased in Canada compared to the Beijing 2008 Summer Games

1.1 million – the number of Olympics-related apps that Canadians downloaded through the 2012 Games

2.5 million – the number of Canadians who headed online to watch Usain Bolt run to his first gold of the London 2012 Games in the 100-metre final. At this event, viewership peaked.

1.9 million – the number of video clicks that were logged for Canada’s Women’s soccer team bronze win

90 per cent – the number of UK’s population that tuned in for Olympic events, according to the BBC

9.5 million – the BBC says this number of people visited the network’s sports site during the Olympics

55 million – the BBC site logged this record number of global browsers

37 million – this is how many UK browsers visited the site during the Games

1.7 million – daily unique visitors to the BBC.com