Texans-Patriots divisional round playoff game the most-watched event in ESPN history

The AFC divisional round game between the Houston Texans and New England Patriots had almost 38 million viewers, the most in ESPN history.

Saturday’s game, which saw the Texans lose on the road to the Patriots with a berth in the AFC championship game on the line, was shown on ESPN, ABC and Spanish-language ESPN Deportes. The game averaged 37,965,000 viewers between the three networks.

That mark, in addition to beating out every other event shown on ESPN since its 1979 debut, also represented 12% viewership growth from ESPN’s 2025 AFC divisional game, where the Texans lost on the road to the dynastic Kansas City Chiefs.

For Disney, parent company of ESPN and ABC, Saturday’s game was the most-watched telecast of any kind since 2014. It also passed the viewership count of the 2006 Rose Bowl on ABC to become Disney’s most-watched telecasts outside of some of its past Super Bowls.

Disney has not aired a Super Bowl since the ABC broadcast of Super Bowl 40 in 2006. ESPN and ABC will be broadcasting Super Bowl LXI in February 2027, the first time a Super Bowl will be shown on ESPN, according to Front Office Sports.

ESPN did not specify which telecast got bumped into the cable network’s second-most-watched event by Saturday’s record-breaking viewership. The sports channel does not have any more NFL playoff games scheduled for this season.

CBS will air the AFC championship, which will see the Patriots visit the Denver Broncos, starting at 3 p.m. Sunday. Fox will air the NFC championship, which features the Los Angeles Rams visiting their NFC West rival Seattle Seahawks, with kickoff at 6:30 p.m.

Super Bowl XL will be broadcast by NBC on Feb. 8.