The last episode of The Last of Us was the most watched of the entire series, even though it aired at the same time as the Oscars.
According to HBO’s parent company Warner Bros Discovery’s ninth and final episode, titled Look for the Light, drew 8.2 million viewers when it first aired on HBO Max and linear television.
These are the highest ratings for an episode premiere of the series, breaking the 8.1 million achieved by the previous episode.
The first episode gave initial estimates of 4.7 million, followed by 5.7 million for episode 2 and 6.4 million for episode 3. The number has continued to grow with each successive episode.
HBO’s The Last of Us – Episode 9 Preview
The company also claims that The Last of Us is now the most-watched program in HBO Max history in Europe and Latin America.
In the US, the show didn’t quite manage to match the numbers set by the Game of Thrones spin-off House of the Dragon, although its growth over the entire season was much higher.
As pointed out VarietyEpisode 1 of House of the Dragon was watched by 9.9 million people, followed by 10.2 million for Episode 2, but by the time it reached its final episode, viewership numbers were 9.3 million.
As Variety says, that means House of the Dragon saw a 6.9% drop in viewership over the course of the series, compared to a 75% increase for The Last of Us.
These figures refer only to the number of viewers of the show during its first airing on Sunday night. Warner Bros notes that while the first episode drew 4.7 million viewers on its debut night, the number is now approaching 40 million in the US alone thanks to subscription service HBO Max.
When subsequent subscription viewing is factored in, House of the Dragon averaged 29 million viewers per episode. Whether The Last of Us can surpass this over time remains to be seen.
The Last of Us has already been renewed for a second season, and earlier this week the creators Neil Druckmann and Craig Mazin apparently confirmed his intentions the third season would be comingsuggesting that Season 2 might not contain everything The Last of Us, Part II game.
