The War of 18-49, Pretty Little Liars

PRETTY LITTLE LIARS (ABC FAMILY)

Scheduling history: Most episodes of Pretty Little Liars have aired on Tuesday at 8/7c, but the network tried its first couple winter runs on what was historically its premier original night (Monday).

See (who saw) how it all began: Pretty Little Liars had a pretty respectable start on ABC Family, opening with 2.47 million viewers and a 0.9 demo on 6/8/10. This put it a bit below the network's flagship show at the time: The Secret Life of the American Teenager, which usually hit low-1's that summer. Liars held its 0.9 in week two, inched up to 1.0 in week three, bounced down to 0.7 and back up to 1.0, and then steadied at 0.9 for the most of the rest of the summer 2010 run. That summer closed on a new series high 1.1 on 8/10/10.

The best of times: Since the midpoint of season one, Pretty Little Liars has had remarkably consistent raw numbers. It's mostly been in the low-1's for the last three and a half seasons. A show built on teases and big reveals, PLL has occasionally spiked big-time for premieres and finales. The series high remains a 1.6 for the season two finale on 3/19/12, and that was massively up from a 1.0 the previous week. The last couple winter runs have also had huge spikes to 1.3, way up from the previous week.

The worst of times: The weakest run of episodes remains the series' opening weeks in summer 2010. The show pulled just a 0.7 in week four of the series on 6/29/10 and took over four years to go that low again (it happened on 1/20/15). The winter 2015 run finally saw raw numbers below the first half of season one, and season five also had the series' biggest year-to-year declines. However, the declines still weren't much more than the average decline for broadcast originals, and the 1.3 to end season five was one of the show's most impressive points ever. The 1.39 to end the first half of season six may have been even better. But PLL finally went into collapse mode in the second half of season six, and it mostly continued throughout the final season. It fell as low as a 0.40 on 5/2/17.

Then vs. now: The raw numbers story with Pretty Little Liars has long been pretty boring, but that kind of consistency has made PLL increasingly valuable over the years. It was an impressive player from day one, but it was outdrawn by Secret Life in its first season and a half. Only starting in 2012 did Pretty Little Liars emerge as ABC Family's top series, and it's now gone several years with no real challengers for that title. Like the CW's flagship The Vampire Diaries, much of its value comes from its great resiliency, even though it skews toward a historically fickle demographic.

Adults 18-49 info by season:

Seas	Year	Slot	Avg	y2y	Lo	Hi	Results	Grade
1	Summer 2010	Tuesday 8:00	0.92		0.7	1.1	detail
	1	Winter 2011	Monday 8:00	1.14		0.9			1.5	detail
2	Summer 2011	Tuesday 8:00	0.97	+6%	0.8	1.3	detail
	2	Winter 2012	Monday 8:00	1.11	-3%	0.8			1.6	detail
3	Summer 2012	Tuesday 8:00	1.02	+5%	0.9	1.3	detail
	3		Winter 2013	Tuesday 8:00	1.17	+6%			1.0	1.4	detail
4	Summer 2013		Tuesday 8:00	1.12	+10%	0.9	1.4		detail
	4		Winter 2014	Tuesday 8:00	1.02	-13%	0.8			1.3	detail
5	2014		Tuesday 8:00	0.94	-16%	0.8	1.1		detail
	5		Winter 2015	Tuesday 8:00	0.88	-14%	0.7			1.3	detail
6	Summer 2015		Tuesday 8:00	0.89	-5%	0.7	1.4	detail	B
	6		Winter 2016	Tuesday 8:00	0.70	-20%	0.6			1.1	detail	B
7	Summer 2016		Tuesday 8:00	0.58	-35%	0.5	0.7	detail	D
	7		Spring 2017	Tuesday 8:00	0.51	-27%	0.4			0.7	detail	D

Historical-adjusted ratings by season:

Seas	Year	A18-49+	Label	Now17	y2y	Lo	Hi	Premiere	Finale
1	Summer 2010	33				25	39	32	39
	1	Winter 2011	45				35	59	59	51
2	Summer 2011	38				31	51	51	39
	2	Winter 2012	47				33	68	55	68
3	Summer 2012	43				37	54	47	51
	3	Winter 2013	56				49	68	68	56
4	Summer 2013	53				41	68	61	68
	4	Winter 2014	54				43	68	64	68
5	2014	50				40	59	59	48
	5	Winter 2015	52				40	76	56	76
6	Summer 2015	53				43	83	63	83
	6	Winter 2016	48				38	73	73	41
7	Summer 2016	40				36	47	46	47
	7	Spring 2017	42				33	59	53	59
AVERAGE:		AVERAGE:	47

The War of 18-49 chronicles the ratings history of veteran primetime series. For more, see the Index.