ABC’s comedies Shifting Gears and Abbott Elementary opened their 2025-26 seasons with decent-sized audiences for their initial airings — and a big bump from streaming and other delayed viewing.
The two shows’ Oct. 1 season premieres added millions of viewers and each more than tripled their initial rating among adults 18-49 over seven days of cross-platform viewing. Abbott, in fact, grew by more than six times its opening number in the key ad-sales demographic.
After a week of streaming on Hulu, Disney+ and other platforms, plus DVR playback, Shifting Gears had 7.57 million viewers and a 1.17 rating among adults 18-49, equivalent to about 1.59 million people in the demo. The total audience grew 73 percent from 4.37 million for the Tim Allen-led show’s first airing on ABC, and its adults 18-49 rating grew by more than three times from its starting point of 0.35.
Abbott Elementary, meanwhile, rose from 2.83 million viewers for its first airing to 6.64 million after a week of cross-platform viewing, a gain of 135 percent. Its 18-49 rating went from 0.29 to 1.9 — a sixfold increase and equivalent to about 2.59 million viewers ages 18 to 49.
A breakdown of linear and streaming viewers for the season premieres isn’t available yet, but the viewing patterns for both shows are similar to last season’s final cross-platform numbers, which cover five weeks of viewing. In those figures, about 42 percent of Shifting Gears’ audience over 35 days came via streaming, while Abbott Elementary collected more than half of its five-week total from streaming. Both shows also got the majority of their 18-49 ratings from digital platforms.
