On Sept. 8, Kim Kardashian West took to Instagram to announce that E!’s longtime hit Keeping Up With the Kardashians would come to a close, airing a final season in 2021. In the 13 years the show has been on the air, it’s propelled the Kardashian family to global fame and enabled an empire spanning everything from clothing and cosmetics lines to apps — not to mention spinoffs.
With KUWTK coming to an end and the penultimate season just kicking off, we dived into the show’s viewership and advertising trends using insights from Inscape, the TV data company with insights from a panel of more than 16 million active, opted-in smart TVs, and always-on TV ad measurement and attribution company iSpot.
Simply put, KUWTK is a powerhouse for E! — and the network obviously knows it, as it runs almost daily marathons. According to iSpot, the series is a primary driver of TV ad impressions for the network, with new and rerun episodes racking up 5 billion impressions so far this year. During the season 18 window (March 26 through April 30), the show delivered 1.7 billion TV ad impressions across new episodes and reruns — nearly four times as many impressions as there were during just new episodes in that timeframe (424.2 million).
E! kept its airing strategy going for the season 19 premiere on Sept. 17, with an almost all-day marathon leading up to the new episode. There were 106.3 million TV ad impressions for the show that day, with 29.9 million occurring during the premiere, representing a 50% decrease from the season 18 premiere and a 26.13% decrease from the season 17 premiere last September. That said, viewers stayed glued to the show and tuned into the commercials during the premiere, with spots performing 7% above the norm for attention, according to iSpot data.
Looking at Inscape’s minute-by-minute viewership data, you can see how tune-in grew throughout the day, spiking at the end of the premiere.
According to Inscape’s season crossover data, 49% of the viewers of season 18 tuned into the season 19 premiere, and 50% of the premiere viewers had watched at least some of season 18.
Notably, many of those fans are from the West Coast — especially California. Per Inscape, the top five local area markets for KUWTK are Bakersfield, California; Palm Springs, California; Corpus Christi, Texas; Los Angeles, California; and Fresno-Visalia, California.
It’s worth noting that the top brands advertising during KUWTK shifted from season 18, according to iSpot’s tracking. During that season, Quibi, Kia, DreamWorks Animation, Ziploc and Sprint were the most-seen brands during new episodes, while for the season 19 premiere, top brands included H&M, TRESemme, LG Appliances, T-Mobile and Cottonelle.
Although it’s likely that E! will continue to air reruns after KUWTK wraps up next year, it’s interesting to take a look at what else the show’s fans are watching on TV. Per Inscape’s viewership crossover data, the list is entirely reality TV shows:
