Stephen Colbert wrapped up his tenure as host of “The Late Show” with his most-watched show in more than a decade.
The series finale of “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” drew 6.7 million viewers on Thursday night, the biggest audience for his show since a post-Super Bowl episode in February 2016, according to preliminary data from Nielsen. The finale was Mr. Colbert’s most watched weeknight episode on record.
The audience total will only grow in the coming days when additional data is factored in, including streaming stats from Paramount+.
Thursday’s episode tripled his usual audience this season, when Mr. Colbert averaged 2.1 million viewers per night, according to Nielsen. (When delayed viewing is factored in, Mr. Colbert’s audience is roughly 2.7 million viewers.)
The audience on Thursday even eclipsed the 6.2 million viewers that tuned in for Jimmy Kimmel’s return from a suspension in September 2025, one of the most anticipated late-night episodes in recent years.
But in a sign of how much television and late-night have changed over the years, Thursday’s viewership was nowhere close to the audiences that Jay Leno or David Letterman amassed for their final episodes several years ago. Mr. Leno’s “Tonight Show” finale drew 14.6 million viewers in February 2014, and Mr. Letterman notched 13.7 million viewers in May 2015 for his swan song for “The Late Show.”
CBS canceled Mr. Colbert’s show last year, arguing that it was no longer profitable. Many have speculated the show was canceled for political reasons. Mr. Colbert has been a passionate critic of President Trump for years, and CBS’s parent company, Paramount, required approval from the administration to complete a merger last year with Skydance.
Mr. Colbert’s final episode ran 18 minutes past its usual stop time — it ended at 12:53 a.m. — and featured a wide array of stars, including Paul McCartney, Ryan Reynolds, Elvis Costello, Paul Rudd and Bryan Cranston, among many others. James Poniewozik, the TV critic at The New York Times, called the episode “an emotional and delightfully bizarre wake for a comedy institution.”
“The Late Show” got some extra help. Much of Mr. Colbert’s competition, including “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” and “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon,” ran reruns “out of respect” for the CBS host, Mr. Kimmel said earlier this week.
Thursday night was the final episode for “The Late Show,” the series that CBS debuted 33 years ago with Mr. Letterman as host. Beginning Friday, Byron Allen’s “Comics Unleashed,” a syndicated show, will take over the 11:35 p.m. time slot.
John Koblin covers the television industry for The Times.
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