Saturday Night Live UK: Viewership & Ratings for Sky Debut

Sky’s British adaptation of the long-running American comedy series Saturday Night Live debuted to an audience of 226,000 viewers in the United Kingdom on Saturday, March 21, 2026, according to official BARB figures supplied by overnights.tv.

The 10PM broadcast on Sky One outperformed Channel 4’s showing of Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, which drew 215,000 viewers in the same time slot. However, both programs were significantly eclipsed by BBC One’s BBC News, which commanded an audience of nearly 2 million.

The launch of SNL UK, featuring a cast of eleven British comedians – Hammed Animashaun, Ayoade Bamgboye, Larry Dean, Celeste Dring, George Fouracres, Ania Magliano, Annabel Marlow, Al Nash, Jack Shep, Emma Sidi and Paddy Young – has generated early buzz, particularly around a sketch featuring Jack Shep as Princess Diana in a parody of a David Attenborough documentary. A clip of the show’s cold open has already garnered over a million views on X, formerly known as Twitter.

The initial viewership figures represent a strong start for Sky, particularly when compared to the performance of the U.S. Version of Saturday Night Live on Sky Comedy. The Season 51 premiere of the American show attracted just 6,800 viewers in the UK on October 5, 2025, while a more recent episode hosted by Harry Styles drew 4,550 viewers, albeit at the later time of 11:30 PM.

Sky’s biggest comedy entertainment series, A League of Their Own, premiered with 60,000 viewers in November 2025, demonstrating the challenges of building an audience in a fragmented media landscape. While A League of Their Own eventually reached 600,000 viewers during its first season, the viewing habits of audiences have shifted significantly in recent years.

Sky has indicated that overnight ratings are not the sole measure of success for SNL UK. The Comcast-owned broadcaster prioritizes metrics that include repeat broadcasts, catch-up viewing on its streaming service NOW and the virality of online clips. The show’s producers anticipate that individual sketches may generate more views online than the television broadcast itself.

Tina Fey appeared in a promotional video for the series, channeling the character of Mary Poppins. The show will feature a recent guest host and musical guest each week, with episodes written, rehearsed, and performed in the week leading up to their broadcast.