The linear viewership for the August 6 episode of South Park has doubled since the season premiere, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Numbers have significantly increased with the second episode since Season 27 took the spotlight. 

The new installment mocked Immigration and Customs enforcement agents, as well as Kristi Noem (who was not very happy), drawing approximately 838,000 viewers for its airing on Comedy Central. This number is nearly double the 430,000 who watched the season premiere on July 23, THR states.  

This episode marks the third-highest initial tune-in viewership that South Park has had in the last three seasons. It trails behind the ChatGPT episode that premiered in March 2023 –  an episode that revolved around an AI bot that is credited as a co-writer with Trey Parker (BASEketball, Despicable Me 3) – which attracted 1.04 million viewers, and the February 2022 season 25 premiere, which had 844,000 viewers, THR adds. 

The Season 27 premiere took a major jab at President Donald Trump, showing him in bed with Satan and mocking his claims about the Epstein situation, among other things. It logged 5.9 million viewers with three days of streaming on Paramount+, as well as delayed viewers, so Wednesday’s numbers show great promise in the eventual total. THR says that the cross-platform numbers will most likely be available next week.  

This episode was the No. 2 primetime show on Wednesday amongst adults between ages 18 and 49, garnering approximately 455,000 viewers in the target ad demographic – a number that was higher than the total audience for the season premiere. The demo was led by CBS’ Big Brother, with slightly over 800,000 viewers ages 18-49, THR notes. 

This dramatic rise for South Park has had positive effects on Digman!, its lead-out. The animated series stars Andy Samberg (Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Palm Springs), and logged 264,000 on-air viewers Wednesday after receiving an average of 144,000 viewers for its first two episodes this season, THR finally mentions.