‘House of the Dragon’ Becomes the Most Watched Premiere in HBO History with 9+ Million Viewers

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Published Aug 23, 2022

Only a couple of days have passed since the highly anticipated series, House of the Dragon, premiered on HBO and all its streaming services. And the Game of Thrones prequel has already broken some major records in the process.

According to a new report released by the streaming platform, the premiere episode of House of the Dragon was watched by 9.986 million U.S. viewers on Sunday night, making it the largest audience for any original series in the network’s history.

Furthermore, the season premiere marked the largest launch on HBO Max in Latin America and the EMEA region (Europe, the Middle East and Africa). The anticipation surrounding the season premiere was at such an all-time high on social media, House of the Dragon became the most trending topic on Twitter and Google Trends.

Milly Alcock and Paddy Considine in 'House of the Dragon' on HBO.

Ollie Upton/HBO

“It was wonderful to see millions of Game of Thrones fans return with us to Westeros last night. House of the Dragon features an incredibly talented cast and crew who poured their heart and soul into the production, and we’re ecstatic with viewers’ positive response,” said Casey Bloys (chief content officer of HBO Max) in a statement. “We look forward to sharing with audiences what else George, Ryan and Miguel have in store for them this season.”

House of the Dragon tells the story of the Targaryen civil war that took place about 200 years before the events in Game of Thrones.

Per The Hollywood Reporter, the prequel series brought in the biggest single-night audience for HBO since the season two premiere of the teen drama, Euphoria. But Game of Thrones still holds the record for the largest single-night season finale, with 19.3 million viewers tuning in back in May 2019.

Given the success of the premiere episode, one can only imagine the records that House of the Dragon will continue to break down the road. New episodes will premiere at 9 p.m ET/PT on HBO and will be available to stream on HBO Max.

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Karelle Mckay

Assistant Editor, News And Entertainment

Karelle McKay is the Assistant Editor of News and Entertainment at PureWow. Before she started writing about all things pop culture, she was a literal couch potato who loved...

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