NTAs draws audience of 7.5 million

Ratings for last night's National Television Awards were up by over 2 million on the previous ceremony, according to overnight viewing figures.

The event, which saw Stephen Fry scoop the 'Special Recognition' and 'Star Travel Documentary' gongs, drew an audience of 7.46m (29.6%) and was the most-watched programme during primetime.

The last NTA ceremony, which took place Wednesday, October 29, 2008, managed 5.27m (22%), and the 2007 event pulled in 6.86m (30.8%).

BBC One's coverage of Aston Villa's game against Blackburn Rovers averaged 4.32m (17.2%) between 7.30pm and 10pm.

Over on BBC Two, 1.96m (7.7%) watched Natural World at 8pm, then Horizon logged 1.85m (7.1%) during the 9pm hour.

Relocation, Relocation returned to 2.48m (9.8%) for Channel 4 during the 8pm hour, then the final part of Gordon's Great Escape took 1.94m (7.8%) at 9pm. Celebrity Big Brother, which aired immediately afterwards at 10.20pm, put in 2.58m (17.2%).

Five's Secrets Of Egypt managed 889k (3.5%) at 8pm, then the audience climbed to 2.14m (8.2%) during the 9pm screening of NCIS.

Overall, ITV1 dominated primetime with an average share of 27.3% compared to BBC One's 18.4%. Channel 4 was third with 8.3% (+1: 0.8%), followed by BBC Two with 6.1% and Five's 4.4%.

Elsewhere, ITV2's backstage coverage of the NTAs grabbed 396k (2.1%) during the 10pm hour.

BARB ratings data supplied by Attentional