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Pokemon DVR Ratings Thread

JinksChow

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With the Pokémon anime going on hiatus, I believe this is a good time to look at Pokémon's DVR viewership ratings and get a feeling as to the reception of the Japanese audience towards the new series.

インターネットTVガイド

First of all, you might be wondering what DVR is, and why should we be using this thing.

Well, DVR stands for Digital Video Recorder; and as the name implies, this electronic device is used to record TV shows.
However, since this is done digitally, this means data regarding viewership can still be obtained.
What's better is since these are recordings, that means the timeslot of the show has little bearing on the viewership rating; as long as you watched the show within the week, your view would still be counted as part of the rating.
(Actually, you might not even be constrained to the week of airing; as the rankings are usually published with a delay of around 2 weeks, that might mean they are waiting to get most of the views for episodes of that week before compiling the data)
This is great news for us, since the new timeslot of the Pokémon anime means it is now competing with Chibi Maruko-Chan and Sazae-San, and thus it has very little chance of appearing within the top 10 of Video Research Ltd's viewership rating, meaning we get absolutely zero data.

In addition, the way DVR presents viewership data is also pretty interesting.
Rather than giving viewership ratings as a percentage of Japanese demographics, they give viewership ratings as a percentage of the most popular show of the category.
For example, a show in first place would always get 100 pts; let's say a show in second place gets 80 pts, that means that show in second place has gotten 80% the amount of viewers that the show in first place has gotten.
That means under this metric, while we aren't getting direct data, we can still get an idea of the relative popularity of shows compared to first place.

I'm probably missing some stuff in my explanation, but this is basically the gist of it.

Now, please don't come in here and tell me that viewership ratings do not matter because the Pokémon anime would keep airing regardless, that's not the point of this thread.
I'm just trying to get a sense of how the Japanese audience is receiving the new series, and a quantitative method seems like a perfectly reasonable way to do things.

Now that everything is out of the way, let's look at some ratings, shall we?
Just for fun, I'll also be doing a side-by-side comparison of Pokémon (2019) to Pokémon SM.
(I want to do a comparison for the XY series as well, but sadly we do not have data going that far back.)


Pokémon (2019) DVR RankingPokémon (2019) DVR RatingsPercentage of DoraemonPercentage of One Piece
Episode 001N/AN/AN/AN/A
Episode 002470.470.4100.9
Episode 003564.764.7102.5
Episode 004563.863.898.8
Episode 005459.159.1106.3
Episode 006466.266.2118.9
Episode 007460.560.5N/A
Episode 008463.163.1101.6
Episode 009553.953.987.4
Episode 010467.867.8102.7
Episode 011474.574.5104.2
Episode 012464.964.9103.5
Episode 013554.854.890.9
Episode 014467.167.1108.2
Episode 015464.764.7N/A
Episode 016466.366.3N/A
Episode 017459.059.0103.7
Episode 018459.059.0107.9
Episode 019455.755.7105.1
Episode 020463.363.3123.9
Episode 021463.063.0124.8
Episode 022460.660.6112.6
Episode 023456.356.3N/A
Episode 024460.360.3N/A
Episode 025459.159.1N/A
Episode 026354.954.9140.8
Episode 027350.950.9110.9
Episode 028450.750.7107.4
Episode 029554.154.199.8
Episode 030553.953.998.2
Episode 031557.157.196.3
Episode 032560.460.493.1
Episode 033454.554.5102.8
Episode 034549.449.476.8
Episode 035560.760.798.9
Episode 036450.150.182.8
Episode 037657.758.994.3
Episode 038650.954.581.7
Episode 039553.553.581.1
Episode 040Unranked<21.6<40.9<63.9
Episode 041Unranked<34.1<69.7<100.0
Episode 0421041.345.468.7
Episode 043945.545.566.5
Episode 044944.344.369.7
Episode 045758.058.083.8
Episode 046749.649.670.3
Episode 047756.756.786.6
Episode 048750.451.876.7
Episode 049851.551.581.1
Episode 050851.051.172.9
Episode 0511034.541.257.4
Episode 052938.846.871.6
Episode 053939.447.575.0
Episode 054842.252.886.7
Episode 055934.951.972.4
Episode 056935.649.576.9
Episode 057832.850.879.4
Episode 058933.852.377.9
Episode 059738.754.2N/A
Episode 0601034.050.877.4
Episode 061754.654.681.0
Episode 062853.353.374.9
Episode 063654.354.391.3
Episode 064754.854.879.2
Episode 065754.254.288.9
Episode 066952.852.872.8
Episode 067756.456.486.8
Episode 068953.953.976.3
Episode 069953.253.275.0
Episode 070854.254.269.2
Episode 071758.458.473.5
Episode 072760.760.775.7
Episode 073752.452.474.5
Episode 074575.4N/A84.9
Episode 075751.051.084.4
Episode 076953.453.483.4
Episode 077749.749.775.1
Episode 078651.951.985.2
Episode 079951.251.275.3
Episode 0801039.051.870.7
Episode 0811036.452.166.7
Episode 082661.761.775.3
Episode 08389.644.964.0
Episode 084621.846.866.5
Episode 085842.542.561.5
Episode 086724.153.769.9
Episode 087827.951.668.9
Episode 088725.550.855.1
Episode 089711.453.772.2
Episode 090612.366.580.9
Episode 091612.453.073.8
Episode 092514.460.3112.5


Pokémon Sun & Moon DVR RankingPokémon Sun & Moon DVR RatingsPercentage of DoraemonPercentage of One Piece
Episode 001N/AN/AN/AN/A
Episode 002N/AN/AN/AN/A
Episode 003641.441.4102.2
Episode 004641.441.4102.2
Episode 005454.054.0123.3
Episode 006646.346.3111.3
Episode 007837.437.490.1
Episode 008366.9N/A106.5
Episode 009573.1N/A109.4
Episode 010838.238.299.2
Episode 011548.4?48.4??125.7?
Episode 012542.542.5108.7
Episode 013740.3?40.3??103.1?
Episode 014745.945.9110.1
Episode 015543.1?43.1??103.4?
Episode 016635.435.495.4
Episode 017365.6N/AN/A
Episode 018739.3?39.3??105.9?
Episode 019568.4N/A101.6
Episode 020635.135.198.0
Episode 021635.135.198.0
Episode 022938.538.596.7
Episode 023936.536.588.6
Episode 024934.934.983.5
Episode 025768.4N/A94.9
Episode 026940.740.796.0
Episode 027940.440.491.8
Episode 028836.036.095.5
Episode 029742.842.8112.3
Episode 030651.951.9113.8
Episode 031540.240.2105.0
Episode 032642.942.9106.7
Episode 033740.140.1105.0
Episode 034654.3N/A98.0
Episode 035541.541.5111.9
Episode 036640.040.0102.3
Episode 037480.3N/A103.5
Episode 038639.139.1100.0
Episode 039840.740.7103.3
Episode 040833.733.794.1
Episode 041644.944.9N/A
Episode 042355.255.2125.2
Episode 043379.0N/A102.1
Episode 044467.3N/AN/A
Episode 045838.238.286.0
Episode 046846.746.795.7
Episode 0471037.037.079.7
Episode 048845.145.192.0
Episode 049644.444.494.3
Episode 050737.537.583.7
Episode 051742.442.488.7
Episode 052541.541.5104.0
Episode 053473.6N/A108.4
Episode 054370.2N/A103.4
Episode 055454.5N/A94.6
Episode 056258.458.4N/A
Episode 057839.739.781.9
Episode 0581039.539.574.5
Episode 059740.540.591.0
Episode 060939.439.482.3
Episode 061553.553.5107.9
Episode 062839.939.977.0
Episode 063548.148.1N/A
Episode 064632.732.775.9
Episode 065443.343.3N/A
Episode 066463.8N/A88.1
Episode 067555.4N/A86.8
Episode 068447.647.6100.0
Episode 069844.044.081.5
Episode 070940.840.873.9
Episode 071839.039.075.4
Episode 072839.039.075.4
Episode 073665.3N/A75.6
Episode 0741033.233.267.5
Episode 075838.438.474.3
Episode 076839.339.371.6
Episode 077934.334.364.2
Episode 078841.641.678.9
Episode 079Unranked<37.9<37.9<67.1
Episode 080937.737.772.3
Episode 081637.137.173.3
Episode 082836.736.777.8
Episode 083643.243.284.9
Episode 084941.741.777.7
Episode 085458.2N/A81.4
Episode 086652.252.297.0
Episode 087842.342.382.5
Episode 088845.945.985.5
Episode 089At Best 6At Best 34.3At Best 34.3N/A
Episode 090838.338.379.3
Episode 091851.2N/A69.8
Episode 0921029.8No DataNo Data
 
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So if I'm reading this correctly it's generally doing better than Sun and Moon but it's peaks aren't as high?

It seems to be consistently rank 4 or 5, while Sun Moon varies from 9 to 3.
 
So if I'm reading this correctly it's generally doing better than Sun and Moon but it's peaks aren't as high?

It seems to be consistently rank 4 or 5, while Sun Moon varies from 9 to 3.

I would argue that Pokemon (2019) is flat out performing better than Pokemon SM.

While SM did reach 3rd place once, that was during the holiday season when all the other big anime are on break. In terms of ratings, SM has only reached the 70's once, and mostly just yo-yoing around the 30's and 40's.

As for Pokemon (2019), it's managed to reach the 70's twice (just barely though), and viewership ratings are holding steady in the mid 50's to high 60's range.
 
@JinksChow how did the episodes of Sun & Moon after the Timeslot Change perform? I wonder if the numbers are high compared to these low Early-SM Numbers because that would confirm the suspicion of people not being able to watch the Episodes on Sundays.
 
@JinksChow how did the episodes of Sun & Moon after the Timeslot Change perform? I wonder if the numbers are high compared to these low Early-SM Numbers because that would confirm the suspicion of people not being able to watch the Episodes on Sundays.

There's the usual short burst of viewership after a hiatus, but afterwards it's back to normal for SM.

Looking at the 5 episodes after the timeslot
change:

Pokémon Sun & Moon DVR RatingsPokémon Sun & Moon DVR Ranking
Episode 09151.28
Episode 09229.810
Episode 09337.67
Episode 09435.98
Episode 09534.18

In fact, I'm pretty sure ratings for SM don't start picking up until near the end
 
It's a shame we don't have the XY numbers which would make it easier to tell if Journeys is performing unexpectedly well or if Sun/Moon did worse than usual (or even both).
Edit: To clarify I don't want Sun/Moon to have done poorly, I'm just curious since I'd read that in the past every series did worse than the last one.
 
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Pokémon (2019) DVR Ratings RERUN EDITION
Since we don't know how long the hiatus will go on, I've decided to make a separate table for just the rerun episodes of Pokémon (2019), which began airing the week of 20/04/2020-26/04/2020.

Please note that the data is published around 2 weeks after initial airing.

Pokémon (2019) DVR Ratings
RERUN EDITION
Pokémon (2019) DVR Ranking
RERUN EDITION
Episode 00136.68
Episode 002<29.8Unranked
Episode 003<37.0Unranked
Episode 004<31.2Unranked
Episode 005<31.9Unranked
Episode 006<34.1Unranked


As it turns out, the Japanese audience isn't that interested in reruns either. Hopefully the situation in Japan gets better soon.
 
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Interesting find, they seem more fun to compare than the other ratings. I'm surprised the ratings didn't change much with the timeslot change. Did they increased in the Alola League?

The peak on SM019 could be explained because it aired too close to New Year's Eve, but I'm clueless on SM017 and SM019.
 
Interesting find, they seem more fun to compare than the other ratings. I'm surprised the ratings didn't change much with the timeslot change. Did they increased in the Alola League?
I'm curious, too. I wouldn't be surprised if the Alola League finals in particular got a spike from people going to catch the historical moment later.
 
To clarify I don't want Sun/Moon to have done poorly, I'm just curious since I'd read that in the past every series did worse than the last one.

For the most part that is true. Although, DP if I remember correctly did better than BF arc of AG.

@JinksChow What is your theory on the PM 13 number? That is the Leon episode. Giving the hype, you would think that episode would be higher.
 
@JinksChow What is your theory on the PM 13 number? That is the Leon episode. Giving the hype, you would think that episode would be higher.

This is just a guess, but since all anime series under first place for that particular week got slightly lower ratings, I would say rather than SS013 underperforming, it is the anime in first place that was overperforming that week, thus leading to seemingly lower numbers.
 
I think it's more about people who are faithful viewers towards the TV Anime rather than people who select and pick and watch selective episodes imo. Although to be fair, SM had better TV ratings in it's first 20 Episodes than PM. SM even did better than XY&Z (Last 47 Episodes of XY).
 
I think it's more about people who are faithful viewers towards the TV Anime rather than people who select and pick and watch selective episodes imo. Although to be fair, SM had better TV ratings in it's first 20 Episodes than PM. SM even did better than XY&Z (Last 47 Episodes of XY).

That's not an apt comparison though, since early episodes of a series always perform better than the last episodes of the previous series. This has happened with early XY - late BW, early BW - late DP, early DP - late AG, as well as early AG - late OS.

You should only compare between equivalent episodes of series (e.g. first episode to first episode); the only exception might be to compare SM episodes post-timeslot change with Pokemon (2019) episodes, since those would be most similar in terms of circumstances.
 
That's not an apt comparison though, since early episodes of a series always perform better than the last episodes of the previous series. This has happened with early XY - late BW, early BW - late DP, early DP - late AG, as well as early AG - late OS.

You should only compare between equivalent episodes of series (e.g. first episode to first episode); the only exception might be to compare SM episodes post-timeslot change with Pokemon (2019) episodes, since those would be most similar in terms of circumstances.
Guess that makes much sense tho. I compared it because XY&Z itself was advertised as a new series but I get your point.
 
Do ratings matter these days?
If you do some promotion, people will watch it on Netflix or other streaming services. I am not sure if the pokemon company and Tokyo TV really care about the ratings. Pokemon will always be popular, so when it airs, Sunday, Tuesday or Thursday or which hour doesnt really matter. There are only a few shows that last as long as pokemon and be as popular. A death slot for pokemon doesnt excist, maybe for other shows.
 
Do ratings matter these days?
If you do some promotion, people will watch it on Netflix or other streaming services. I am not sure if the pokemon company and Tokyo TV really care about the ratings. Pokemon will always be popular, so when it airs, Sunday, Tuesday or Thursday or which hour doesnt really matter. There are only a few shows that last as long as pokemon and be as popular. A death slot for pokemon doesnt excist, maybe for other shows.

As I've said in the OP, I'm only using ratings here as an attempt at an objective measure of the Japanese audience's interest in the anime. The Pokémon anime would keep on airing as long as the Pokemon Company still see it as worthwhile. We have also had Japanese news articles in the past stating that TVTokyo does not care about viewership ratings, so there's that as well. In that sense, you're correct in saying a death slot doesn't exist for Pokemon.

(Unless they decide to air Pokemon at like 3 in the morning or something, then I think we can all agree TVTokyo just straight up don't care)

However, viewership still indicates interest; rises and falls in viewership within the same series even more so. As such, I'm just comparing ratings within the same series to see if the new series is successfully capturing its audience.

Also, the few anime that has aired as long or even longer than Pokemon, all seem to be enjoying higher ratings/more popular than Pokemon. Maybe Yu-Gi-Oh (or whatever the current spinoff is called) is less popular?

The DVR website has put out an update for the week 2020/04/27 - 2020/05/03, and um...

As it turns out, the rerun of the second episode of Pokémon (2019) has completely slipped out of the top 10 anime ranking, so we don't even get viewership data for this episode.

At this point, all we can say is that the episode got less than 29.8 points and is unranked.
 
Another week, another update

So perhaps unsurprisingly, the rerun of Pokémon (2019) Episode 3 has once again missed the top 10 ranking. Given that 10th place has higher viewership ratings than last week, we don't even know if more or less people tuned in for this episode.

One thing of note though is that Yokai Watch Jam is the anime in 10th place this week, making this the first time in months/years that it has beaten Pokémon in DVR viewership ratings.
(However, it took Pokémon going on reruns and Yokai Watch continuing to air new episodes to accomplish this)
 
JinksChow said:
I'm just trying to get a sense of how the Japanese audience is receiving the new series, and a quantitative method seems like a perfectly reasonable way to do things.

Except it doesn't, because DVR recordings are far from being the only options fans have to watch the show. If you want a quantitative method of interest in the show you're also going to need to get a combination of regular TV ratings, YouTube streaming numbers, Hulu streaming numbers, Amazon Prime streaming numbers, and illegal downloads. DVR ratings by themselves don't tell us much of anything.

However, viewership still indicates interest; rises and falls in viewership within the same series even more so.

No, it means "oh, the show's on YouTube now, I can just watch it on my phone now instead of having to DVR it every week."


Don't get me wrong, the data in this thread is nice to have. But let's not kid ourselves into thinking it comes even close to giving us the full picture of how many people are watching Pocket Monsters in Japan.
 
Except it doesn't, because DVR recordings are far from being the only options fans have to watch the show. If you want a quantitative method of interest in the show you're also going to need to get a combination of regular TV ratings, YouTube streaming numbers, Hulu streaming numbers, Amazon Prime streaming numbers, and illegal downloads. DVR ratings by themselves don't tell us much of anything.



No, it means "oh, the show's on YouTube now, I can just watch it on my phone now instead of having to DVR it every week."


Don't get me wrong, the data in this thread is nice to have. But let's not kid ourselves into thinking it comes even close to giving us the full picture of how many people are watching Pocket Monsters in Japan.

I get where you're coming from, but including illegal downloads as well? That's like saying Nintendo should include download numbers for Citra (a 3DS emulator) in their sales data for 3DS consoles.

As for DVR not including all Japanese viewers; while that is true, it still has a big enough sample size (research papers show that adoption rates of DVR in Japan is strong). Take current presidential national polls as an example: they might not survey/poll every single citizen and have some inaccuracies (looking at 2016), but they still provide a general picture of who is leading. Sometimes there's no way to get the full picture, so a general picture is what we have to settle with.

But maybe one would argue that DVR doesn't even provide a general picture. Perhaps they don't sell to a certain demographic, or perhaps they don't broadcast all shows on TV. If it comes down to that, at the very least these ratings show rise and fall of interest within the platform itself. If that's the case, then whether or not that trend extends outside of DVR is up to interpretation.

In fact, we can see this exactly with Video Research Ltd's viewership ratings. Even though after the timeslot change, Pokemon SM has almost completely disappeared from the top 10 rankings, in actuality there is roughly the same amount of people still interested in the anime.

---

New week, new update, same old situation with rankings.

Once again, 10th place this week is Yokai Watch Jam. Maybe we're seeing a comeback for this spinoff series (probably not)

Actually, the biggest news this week is that tvguide has revamped the way they present DVR ratings, and it seems that they have wiped everything from before April 2020.

Luckily, I have the data for past DVR ratings saved on my computer, but unfortunately now there is no easy way for people to verify the ratings I post for Pokémon SM...

This sort of mirrors the situation with Video Research Ltd's viewership ratings, where they continuously remove ratings from older years; by now, the only easily accessible records we have for anime tv ratings from before 2017 are from animenewsnetwork.

---

Hey guys! It's update time!

Now I know what you're thinking, you're thinking that there is no way that Pokémon is appearing in the top 10... But You're Wrong!

Boom! 1st place overall with 100pts, beating even Doraemon, the most popular thing on DVR during the week of 18/05/2020 - 24/05/2020!
Even on the regular Video Research Ltd's viewership ratings, it managed to get 11.8%; that's more than 1 in 10 people in Japan who were exposed to Pokémon that week! Now that's popularity!

The catch is... Pokémon did get first place, but not for the main anime. What got first place was actually the special TV broadcast of Detective Pikachu.
This is really wild, because TV broadcasts of the Pokémon anime movies have never gotten that high in ratings before (Usually around 3-5% on Video Research Ltd's viewership ratings if I'm not mistaken).

Since Doraemon got 70.3pts on the overall rating, that means Detective Pikachu roughly got 142.2pts in terms of anime DVR ratings; that's more than twice of what Pokémon (2019) normally does, and more than 5 times of what the rerun episodes are currently doing. (This is not an apt comparison, this is just to give you a rough idea of how crazy good Detective Pikachu did)

So what's different for Detective Pikachu compared to the TV broadcasts of Pokémon anime movies? For starters, it aired on Nippon TV instead of TVTokyo; in addition, it aired on a Friday at 9pm instead of replacing the main anime in their timeslot. This really shows that Pokémon has so much brand power in Japan, it's just being squandered by TVTokyo in their decision to dump the anime onto Sundays against Chibi Maruko-Chan.

(Once again, I know viewership ratings don't matter; but simply moving Pokémon to Fridays by replacing Yokai Watch Jam would absolutely let more kids watch the anime)

As for the rerun of Pokémon (2019)? What did you expect, of course it missed out on the anime top 10, with 10th place once again going to Yokai Watch Jam.
 
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