The 2026 Winter Olympics have officially come to a close, with Team USA marking its best finish since 2010 and placing second in the medal standings. Along with improved performances came a significant increase in fan engagement and viewership.
Team USA finished with an impressive 12 gold medals, its most ever at the Winter Games. Meanwhile, NBC broke its viewership records, making the 17-day event its most-watched Winter Olympics since 2014. The coverage averaged 23.5 million viewers across NBC, Peacock, NBCUniversal’s digital platforms and Versant’s USA Network and CNBC.
However, NBC’s “Legendary February” featured more than just the Milan-Cortina Games. The month also included the Super Bowl and NBA All-Star Weekend, and the company is reporting total monthly viewership of more than 200 million people.
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According to the company, a total of 215 million viewers tuned in to the network during the month, driven by historic audiences across the Winter Olympics, NFL and NBA. In addition to delivering the highest Winter Olympics viewership since 2014, the Super Bowl became the most-watched program in NBC’s 100-year history, while the NBA All-Star Game recorded its highest ratings since 2011.
“The Milan Cortina Olympics proved once again that the American audience will gather in large numbers over 17 days to experience this unmatched global competition. These Winter Games — superbly hosted across northern Italy, and produced and distributed by a team of 2,700 — reached blockbuster U.S. audiences of more than 50 million viewers each day, continuing the media dominance we experienced less than two years ago at the Paris Olympics," said NBC Olympics president Gary Zenkel.
NBC will also serve as the U.S. broadcast home of the 2028 Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles, as well as five Olympic Games over the next decade.
Team USA closed the event with a thrilling victory in the men’s ice hockey gold-medal game, defeating Canada in overtime to secure the Americans' 12th gold medal. The team collected a total of 33 medals — 12 gold, 12 silver and 9 bronze — to finish second in the overall medal count behind Norway.