NFL Kickoff record 28.9 million viewers watch Kansas City hold off Baltimore

Kansas City 's thrilling 27-20 victory over Baltimore on Thursday night was the most-watched NFL Kickoff game since it started in 2002.

The game had a total audience average of 28.9 million, surpassing the 27.6 million that watched the New England Patriots defeat the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 2015 opener on NBC . Streaming did not start getting added to audience figures until 2016.

It was a 5% increase from the 27.5 million that watched Detroit beat Kansas City in last year’s opener.

Despite the start of the game being delayed 20 minutes due to a storm that included lightning, NBC averaged 24.3 million, according to Nielsen, with the audience peaking at 33 million during the second quarter (9:30-9:45 p.m. EDT).

It also drew a 37 share on NBC, which is its largest for any regular-season game since it started carrying NFL prime time games in 2006. A share is the percentage of all television sets in use at a given time watching a program.

According to Adobe Analytics, streaming on Peacock, NBC and NFL digital platforms averaged 4.6 million.

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