Friday, May 22, 2026

Not Good News for “American Idol” as Ratings Continue Drop, “The Voice” Hangs in There

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Something about “American Idol” is just not clicking with the audience.

On Monday night, “Idol” ratings dropped again, this time to 6.9 million viewers. Last Monday, “Idol” was at 7.7 million.

On Sunday night, “Idol” dropped about a million viewers from the prior Sunday.

Meanwhile, “The Voice” remained in good shape with 9.3 million, down 500,000 from the week before.

It’s true that the ratings for these shows sag in the middle of their seasons while the competition works itself out. They come back for the big finales, certainly. But “Idol” is slowly eroding to the point where not many will care who the finalists are next month.

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Roger Friedman
Roger Friedmanhttps://www.showbiz411.com
Roger Friedman is the founder and editor-in-chief of Showbiz411. He wrote the FOX411 column on FoxNews.com from 1999 to 2009 and previously edited Fame magazine and wrote the "Intelligencer" column at New York magazine. His bylines have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, the New York Daily News, the New York Post, Vogue, Details, and the Miami Herald. He is a voting member of the Critics Choice Awards (Film and Television branches), and his movie reviews are tracked by Rotten Tomatoes. is articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. With D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus, he co-produced the 2002 documentary "Only the Strong Survive," which screened at Directors' Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival.

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