ABC says ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ racked up 6.3 million viewers on broadcast in his late

(CNN) — The first new episode of “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” since his suspension averaged 6.3 million viewers via traditional television, more than three times the show’s typical TV viewership, even though the show was blacked out in dozens of markets.

In the key advertiser-friendly demographic of viewers ages 18 to 49, the show scored its “highest regularly scheduled episode in over 10 years,” ABC said Wednesday afternoon.

And on YouTube, Kimmel has been gaining more than a million views per hour. Combining ABC, YouTube and social media platforms, Kimmel’s monologue about free speech in America has reached tens of millions of people, and the view counts are still rising.

The preliminary Nielsen ratings, which will grow later once on-demand viewership is calculated, are all the more notabl