The 2019 Golden Globes were the lowest rated in three years

Awards show ratings just keep falling, and the 2019 Golden Globes were no exception — but for NBC, it's not all bad news.

18.61 million people tuned into the annual awards ceremony this year, down from 19.02 million viewers in 2018, making this the lowest-rated Golden Globes in three years, according to The Hollywood Reporter. But the show experienced a much less severe decline than other recent awards shows. The 2018 Oscars, for instance, was a complete ratings disaster: it was the lowest-rated broadcast in the show's near 100-year history, with about 6.5 million fewer viewers than the previous year, Variety reported. The 2018 Emmys also sank to a new low and lost 1.2 million viewers from the year prior.

The 2019 Golden Globes also actually saw a very slight increase in the key demographic of viewers between the ages of 18 and 49, Entertainment Weekly notes as one big plus for NBC. Deadline points out that this year's show had the unique benefit of airing with a football game as the lead-in, though, so one could argue this result is still disappointing in that the game should have boosted overall viewership. But the state of awards shows is just so dire right now, as viewers continue to cut cable and gravitate away from live events that aren't sports, that the Golden Globes reaching a three-year low but not sinking quite as badly as it could have is kind of a win.