CBS Evening News with Tony Dokoupil posted week-to-week gains in both total viewers and Adults 25-54 for the week of May 11, 2026, finishing with 3.806 million viewers and 503,000 in the key demo. It was the only evening newscast to rise in both measures that week.
The CBS broadcast was up 3% in total viewers from the previous week and 6% in Adults 25-54, moving back above 500,000 demo viewers for the first time since the week of April 27, 2026. The numbers, based on national live+same-day big data plus program ratings from Nielsen, show a small but clear lift at a time when the evening news race remained led by ABC World News Tonight, which averaged 7.889 million total viewers and 962,000 Adults 25-54. NBC Nightly News finished second with 5.97 million total viewers and 831,000 Adults 25-54.
That puts CBS in a narrow but notable spot: not close to the top overall, but the only network to improve across the board in a week when the others did not. The retitling of Friday's NBC and CBS broadcasts also meant those editions were excluded from the weekly and season averages, leaving the May 11 report centered on the strength of the regular weekday telecasts.
For CBS, the question is no longer whether the newscast can post gains in isolation. It has done that. The real test is whether Dokoupil can turn a week like this into something more durable in a competition where ABC still leads by a wide margin and NBC remains firmly in second.
