Nielsen Streaming Ratings: Netflix’s Scrappy ‘Outer Banks’ Maintains the No. 1 Spot

The scrappy Pogues from 'Outer Banks' have a message for Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos: 'You think you're better than us?' (Image credit: Netflix)

For the second consecutive week the Netflix original series Outer Banks was the most watched show on the major U.S. subscription streaming services, attracting 1.16 billion viewing minutes during the week of Aug. 9-15, according to Nielsen.

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While that’s down by 940 million minutes week over week, it seems audiences are taken with the North Carolina beach town-set coming-of-age drama, which premiered its second 10-episode season on July 30.

Netflix has yet to announce a third season of Outer Banks.

Nielsen Streaming Ratings August 9-15 — (Image credit: Nielsen)

Taking the No. 2 spot on Nielsen’s SVOD chart for the second consecutive week was Netflix’s off-network streaming of another young-adult-focused drama, the CW’s All American. Focused on a star football player for fictional inner-city high school who gets recruited to play for Beverly Hills High, All American garnered 883 million viewing minutes for the week ending August 15. The third season of All American premiered on Netflix on July 27.

New to the Nielsen top 10 list was Vivo, an animated musical starring and featuring new songs from Lin-Manuel Miranda that debuted on Netflix on August 6. The movie drew 802 million viewing minutes, placing it in the No. 3 spot. According to Nielsen, Vivo “was up almost 40% in its first full week, with half of the viewing coming from children age 2-11, and a third of which came from Hispanic households.”

The film was initially scheduled to be released in theaters on June 4, 2021 by Sony Pictures Animation, but in April the studio licensed Vivo to Netflix. Sony Pictures retained home entertainment and linear television rights as well as all rights in China. The Vivo deal was made outside the broader Netflix and Sony Pictures Entertainment licensing deal that was announced in April, which allows the streaming service an exclusive window for the studio’s theatrical titles beginning in 2022.

Vivo is the titular character, a kinkajou, voiced by Miranda, who spends his days playing music to the crowds in a lively Havana square with his owner Andrés. Vivo is directed by Kirk DeMicco (The Croods) with co-director Brandon Jeffords (Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs 2). Quiara Alegría Hudes, who penned the book for Miranda’s In The Heights, co-wrote the screenplay alongside DeMicco.

What Netflix paid for Vivo hasn’t been reported, but back in January Sony sold the animated comedy The Mitchells vs. The Machines to the service for a reported $100 million.

Nielsen Streaming Ratings - Movies August 9-15 — (Image credit: Nielsen)

Meanwhile, Netflix off-net run of AMC’s The Walking Dead dropped three spots to No. 6 during the week of August 9. The post-apocalyptic television tallied 606 million viewing minutes, down 114 million minutes week over week. Season 10 of The Walking Dead premiered on Netflix on July 26.

Nielsen Weekly Ratings - Acquired Series August 9-15 — (Image credit: Nielsen)

Coming in at No. 8 was Netflix’s Hit & Run from Fauda co-creators Avi Issacharoff and Lior Raz. The nine-episode series premiered on August 6 and garnered 549 million viewing minutes during the week ending August 15. Focused oil a happily married man (Raz) whose life is turned upside down when his wife is killed in a mysterious hit-and-run accident, Hit & Run, per Netflix, landed in the streamer’s Top 10 a day after its debut.

Taking the No. 10 spot on Nielsen’s SVOD chart was Netflix offnet show Chicago Med with 527 million viewing minutes. The first five seasons of the NBC medical drama, which has been on the air since 2015, debuted on Netflix on July 22. The show also streams on Hulu, Peacock and Amazon Prime.