'The X Factor' opens to 9.9 million

The new series of The X Factor launched to 9.9 million viewers last night, according to early figures.

The opening episode of series six, which saw the introduction of a Britain's Got Talent-style public audition format, averaged 9.91m (47.9%) for ITV1 between 7pm and 8.30pm. The audience is down slightly on the opener for series five, which averaged 10.19m (48.2%) on August 16 last year.

Last night the ratings peaked with a hefty 11.64m (52.2%) at 8.20pm.

ITV2 spinoff show The Xtra Factor also performed well, averaging 1.15m (6.2%) over an hour from 8.30pm. A further 190k (1.1%) watched on timeshift.

After The X Factor on ITV1, new Phillip Schofield-fronted gameshow The Cube made an admirable debut, averaging 5.52m (26.7%) between 8.30pm and 9.30pm.

BBC One's Total Wipeout logged 2.68m (14.5%) from 6.40pm, a significant fall from last week's 4.23m (24.7%). The audience then dropped to 2.22m (10.4%) for The National Lottery: Guesstimation, after which the draw itself managed 3.2m (14.7%). A rerun of Outnumbered put in 3.27m (15.8%) from 8.30pm, then Michael McIntyre: Live & Laughing had a decent 4.65m (23%).

Continuing coverage of The Proms averaged 845k (4.2%) for BBC Two between 8.10pm and 10.30pm.

On Channel 4, a double bill of ER put in just 307k (1.5%) and 449k (2.1%) from 7.10pm. At 9pm, the latest update from Big Brother interested 1.43m (7.1%) and a further 241k (1.5%) on Channel 4+1.

Five's NCIS had 1.34m (6.3%) in the 8pm hour, then CSI grew the audience to 1.89m (9.3%). Law & Order: SVU brought in 1.37m (7.8%) at 10pm, then Law & Order: Criminal Intent closed off the night with 961k (7.6%).

Overall, ITV1 led primetime with an average audience share of 30% to BBC One's 18.5%. BBC Two was third with 7.5%, followed by Five with 6.9% and Channel 4 with 4.5% (+1: 0.5%).

BARB ratings data supplied by Attentional