Recommendations of the Editorial team
The ratings are in, and it’s official: “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” has gone out with a bang. According to preliminary Nielsen data, 6.74 million people tuned in for the finale on Thursday evening – the most-watched weekday edition the show has ever had.
These historic numbers mark a notable jump from the broadcast average in the first quarter of 2026, which was 2.69 million viewers, Variety reports. This means that the finale’s audience rating is just above the premiere of the “Late Show” in 2015, which attracted an average of 6.55 million viewers.
The record numbers come less than a year after CBS made the decision to cancel its late-night talk show, which Colbert hosted for more than a decade. In August 2025, the broadcaster gave financial reasons for the mysterious step – but speculation continues about the true motives. At the time, CBS’ parent company Paramount was finalizing a merger with Skydance Media that still needed government approval. In addition, just days before the cancellation announcement, Colbert had attacked Paramount over its $16 million settlement with Trump – a deal the comedian-host described as a “big bribe.”
Evening of the stars
Colbert bid farewell to his beloved show with a celebrity-filled evening at New York’s Ed Sullivan Theater. Paul McCartney was the official final guest, but Jon Stewart, Bryan Cranston, Paul Rudd, Tim Meadows, Strike Force Five and Neil deGrasse Tyson also made appearances. McCartney had the audience on their feet as he performed a moving version of the Beatles’ classic “Hello, Goodbye” alongside Elvis Costello, Colbert’s former bandleader Jon Batiste and current bandleader Louis Cato.
In his final monologue, Colbert addressed the audience directly. “On the first night of The Colbert Report,” he said, referring to his long-running Comedy Central talk show, “I said, ‘Anyone can read you the news. I promise to make you feel the news.’ And I realized pretty quickly that our task here was different. We were here for the news together with “To feel you – and I don’t know about you, but I fucking felt them.”
