Super Bowl 50 grabbed an incredible average audience of 111.9 viewers as the Denver Broncos beat the Carolina Panthers, but it wasn't enough to surpass the ratings seen for Super Bowl XLIX in 2015, according to Nielsen. The championship game on Sunday fell just short of last year, which brought in 114.1 million people to watch.
This year's Super Bowl reached peak viewers between 8:30 and 9 p.m. with 115.5 million people tuning in for the halftime show featuring Coldplay, Beyoncé and Bruno Mars. In comparison, Beyoncé pulled in 110.8 million viewers for her performance in 2013 and Bruno Mars attracted 115.3 million viewers in 2014.
Audiences streaming the big game also increased with 3.96 million people watching on CBS and NFL properties. The average audience minute for streaming was 1.4 million.
In the post-Super Bowl slot, "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" drew 21.14 million people for his live broadcast that started about an hour late, according to CBS. It was the largest audience ever for the show, but failed to reach the heights of NBC's "The Blacklist," which garnered 25.7 million viewers for its post-Super Bowl show last year.
Following the local news, "The Late Late Show with James Corden" also had its most-watched episode since the show's inception in 1995.
