David Letterman's farewell from late night on Wednesday evening earned him the biggest audience in close to 21 years.
Nielsen reports that 13.76 million people watched the episode, which is the largest audience for the show since Feb. 25, 1994, which had the help of CBS's Winter Olympics coverage as a lead-in.
Additionally, the "Late Show" earned a rating of 4.1 with its target audience demographic, Adults aged 25 to 54 years old. It also rated a 3.1 with the advertiser-coveted Adults 18 to 49-year-old audience. Both demo ratings are the show's highest numbers since Dec. 1, 2005, the night Oprah Winfrey (who Letterman had been publicly feuding with) guested.
As if those numbers weren't enough for CBS to call it a half day, they're probably popping champagne over the boost Letterman gave to "The Late Late Show With James Corden."
Corden attracted 4.01 million total viewers, its largest audience ever and the largest audience for any host of the "Late Late Show." As for the key demos, the show earned a 1.4 with Adults 25-54 and a 1.1 in Adults 18-49, both representing his highest ratings of the show's run.
A big number was to be expected after seeing early numbers Thursday morning, which showed the goodbye episode earned a huge 9.3/24 in local ratings. That's the highest early ratings since the Winfrey appearance on Dec. 1, 2005.
To give you an idea about how big that is for Letterman, last night's early numbers represent a 127% increase over Monday's episode (4.1/11) with guests Tom Hanks — appearing for the 60th time on the show — and rocker Eddie Vedder.
Additionally, "Late Show's" finale beat all primetime shows on Wednesday.
"The Late, Late Show with James Corden" also got a bump from its lead-in. Its early ratings, 2.5/10, are a new all-time high for the program. That represents a 79% increase over last week (1.4/05) and 150% increase from last year (1.0/03).
Letterman's finale episode showed a mix of favorite segments like Top Ten Lists and memorable moments. The highlight of the night was the star-studded reading of the final Top Ten List with guests Chris Rock, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Peyton Manning and Tina Fey, among others.
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