The Late Show with Stephen Colbert ended for good last night, but the late-night series certainly went out with a bang, rather than a whimper, as early ratings reveal a major audience win.
According to Variety, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert‘s series finale, which aired Thursday, May 21, is the show’s most-watched weeknight episode of all time, per early data from CBS. The installment pulled in 6.47 million viewers on Thursday night, not accounting for next-day streaming or viewing.
That number is up from the show’s 2026 Q1 average of 2.69 million viewers, per live+7 big data info. The audience is even bigger than the original number that tuned into the series premiere of Colbert’s run on The Late Show on September 8, 2015, which garnered 6.55 million viewers at the time.
The most-watched episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert remains the post-Super Bowl installment that aired on February 7, 2016, which pulled in 20.55 million viewers with a 10:54pm ET start time.
Scott Kowalchyk / CBS
As viewers know, the final episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert kicked off its East Coast broadcast at around 11:37 p.m. ET, and featured a slew of famous faces as Colbert was celebrated by Jon Stewart, Bryan Cranston, Paul Rudd, Tim Meadows, Ryan Reynolds, Tig Notaro, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and many more.
The evening featured a one-on-one interview between Colbert and Beatles star, Paul McCartney, who famously made his American TV debut on the Ed Sullivan Show upon the same stage where The Late Show concluded its run. The episode was capped by a joyous and emotional music performance that invited the show’s staff and crew onstage to share in the spotlight one last time.
As fans know by now, Colbert’s final season was known ahead of time when CBS abruptly announced in 2025 that the show would end with the 2025-2026 TV season.
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