After a solid showing for its initial broadcast, The Golden Bachelor continued gathering momentum in the subsequent days — enough to hit a three-year high for the Bachelor franchise in total viewers.

The Sept. 28 premiere rose to 7.7 million viewers after three days of cross-platform viewing, a gain of 3.34 million viewers (and almost 77 percent) over its on-air tally of 4.36 million. The episode also more than tripled its adults 18-49 rating, rising from 0.62 for the initial broadcast to 1.9 after three days.

The total viewer count was the best three-day total for any installment of the Bachelor franchise since a season 16 episode of The Bachelorette in November 2020. In the 18-49 demographic, it’s the best showing for the franchise since the “After the Final Rose” follow-up to season 26 of The Bachelor in March 2022.

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Additionally, ABC says the premiere recorded the equivalent of 1.76 million complete showings on Hulu — the highest three-day tally ever for a series premiere of an ABC show on the platform. (Like Netflix and Disney+, Hulu is calculating “views” as total viewing time divided by running time. That formula is also enshrined as part of the Writers Guild of America’s new contract to help determine a success-based residual for original streaming series.)

The Golden Bachelor follows 72-year-old widower Gerry Turner as he seeks another chance at love from among a group of age-appropriate women. Like the rest of the Bachelor franchise, the show comes from Warner Bros. Unscripted Television in association with Warner Horizon.