OOAK Table Tennis Forum

2017 World Table Tennis Championships Smashes Social & Viewership Records

The epic Men's Singles final showdown between Ma Long & Fan Zhendong attracted 50.16 million unique TV viewers on CCTV alone!
The Liebherr 2017 World Table Tennis Championships has smashed social & viewership records to become the most followed table tennis event in history.

The world’s biggest table tennis event, which was held in Düsseldorf, Germany from 29 May to 5 June 2017, was followed by fans in 122 territories through TV broadcast and Over-the-top (OTT) platform streaming, reaching over 355.6 million audience worldwide.

In China alone, more than 319.1 million viewers tuned in to the event on CCTV5 & CCTV5+ to follow the results on their favorite stars.

Data provided by CSM Sports & Media Research has revealed that 6 matches from the World Championships, including the Men’s & Women’s Singles Finals, has made it to the Top 10 of Sports in China so far in 2017, in terms of viewership figures.

Managing Director of CSM Sports & Media, Mr. Pierre JUSTO stated “The Liebherr 2017 World Table Tennis Championships has jumped to another level in terms of table tennis coverage and viewership around the globe, with over 1,200 hours of coverage in all parts of the globe.”

“The World Championships was more visible than ever by tennis fans around the globe. Our research shows that the 8-days event was watched by more than 300 m unique viewers on the 5 continents, a significant rise from all the previous World Championships, making it on par with the other big sporting players in the world.”

ITTF Acting CEO Mr. Steve DAINTON shared “We considered it imperative that since taking the Commercial rights back in house, we have to ensure our World Championships received the best TV numbers ever. Together with our partner Lagaredere who put extra efforts to ensure a wide global audience, we are extremely satisfied with the result and are proud to say its arguably the most viewed Word Table Tennis Championships ever.”

With the introduction of new innovations such as aerial cam and ball tracking technology to bring new insights of the game to fans, the ITTF’s digital and social media platforms were able to achieve higher level of views.

itTV, the ITTF’s free online streaming platform, which offered 8 tables of action live from Düsseldorf, attracted 810,000 fans to tune in to the event from their mobile devices at the own convenience. The ITTF’s Youtube channel, which offered match highlights, interviews and other exclusive features also hit 2.4 million views.

The 2017 World Championships was another breakthrough for the ITTF on social media with the help of increased social content creation. The “#TATADoorTricks” trickshot challenge, “STIGA Point of the Day” as well as a new “Liebherr Live” daily show that reviews actions of the day and preview following day’s exciting upcoming matches with athletes’ and coaches, were well received by fans to contribute to the record figures on the ITTF’s digital & social media platforms.

2017 World Championships related content reached 10.3 million table tennis enthusiasts on Facebook and leaving 34.7 million impressions on Facebook during the event.

In partnership with Weibo Sports in China, the event was a big success on the ITTF’s weibo page, which now has over 1.33 million followers. The 2017 World Championships was one of the top trending hot topics on Weibo in China for the duration of the event, leaving a staggering 240 million impressions over the 8-days period.

#ITTFWorlds2017 Media Statistics:
TV & OTT Broadcast : 122 Countries
TV Viewership in China : 320.43 million
Worldwide TV Viewership : 355.6 million
ITTF.com Unique Visitors : 640,000
itTV Viewership : 810,000
Total Facebook Reach : 10.3 million
Facebook Impressions : 34.7 million
Facebook Engagement : 4.9 million
Facebook Video Views : 4.3 million views, 2.7 million minutes viewed
Twitter Impressions : 3.3 million
Instagram Impressions : 7.5 million
Youtube Video Views : 2.4 million views, 4.4 million minutes viewed
Weibo Impressions : 240 million
Media Articles : 12,400

The game, which saw the Denver Broncos win a defensive battle over the Carolina Panthers 24-10, averaged 111.9 million TV viewers.

This number was a decline from last year's record viewership of 114.4 million people on NBC.

The Super Bowl in 2014 had the second largest viewership with an average audience of 112.2 million.