The season premiere of Arrow drew a 0.6 share and 1.6 million viewers last night, down slightly from last season’s premiere.
Last year, the series opened with a 0.7 share and 1.9 million viewers.
Videos by ComicBook.com
Ratings for The CW‘s superhero shows have been down slightly for the most part; both Supergirl and The Flash opened a little bit below what they did last season, while DC’s Legends of Tomorrow held steady.
Arrow, which moved to Thursday nights at 9 p.m. after five seasons in the Wednesdays-at-8 slot, ticked down slightly, while its Wednesday night replacement, Riverdale, soared to a series high.
Arrow enjoyed a solid lead-in from The CW stalwart Supernatural, which opened its 13th season with a 0.7 share and 2.1 million viewers, about the same as they launched season 12 with last year.
As a result of the change in time slot, Arrow faces tough competition from Scandal and This Is Us, two of the biggest shows on TV. With the explosion of Riverdale‘s popularity, driven by an audience that fell in love with the show on streaming services like Netflix over the summer, it is unlikely the network is particularly worried about the small drop in ratings for their superhero shows, which have become the network’s flagship properties since Arrow launched in 2012. In its first season, Riverdale‘s overnight ratings often hovered around 1 million viewers per episode.
The real test for Arrow this season may be what comes after the premiere: it would not have been unreasonable to expect a larger opening given the high-profile cliffhanger season 5 left on, and the potential for seismic change to the long-running series. 1.6 million is not a bad number, but a further drop would need to be offset by great live+7 and streaming numbers.
Arrow airs on Thursday nights at 9 p.m. ET/PT on The CW.
