Every year rival talent shows The X Factor and Strictly Come Dancing battle over reeling in the most viewers, and last night the BBC dance show took the lead.
Saturday night (5th September) was the first time that the shows went head to head this year, with Strictly’s first episode introducing the celebrity contestants and pairing them up with the dancers.
This pulled in an amazing average of 8.7 million viewers - 9.7 million at its peak.
Yesterday The X Factor pulled in an average of 7.5million viewers for its third episode, peaking at nine million.
It’s a bit awks for cocky XF boss man Simon Cowell, as just last week he said his show could easily beat Strictly in the rating war. He said:
"I'd hate to say yes, because I know what will happen if I say yes, it will come back and haunt me.
"This show does feel better, the talent's great, they're interesting, so if it's us versus Peter Andre, I'm going to put my money on us."
Aww poor Pete! We we’re quite excited to see Pete get his dancing shoes on personally.
A Strictly Come Dancing source said:
"Everyone is delighted that Strictly has had its highest ratings for a launch show since 2006.
"All we want to do is give viewers a high quality, entertaining, sparkly evening of fun on BBC One and it is clear from the figures that the appetite for the show is as strong as it has ever been.
"We absolutely aren't going to rest on our laurels though, and everyone is now working hard to get ready for the live shows at the end of the month."
As for the launch of the 12th series of The X Factor last week, with judges Rita Ora, Nick Grimshaw, Cheryl Versini-Fernandez and the man himself Simon, the show got an average of 7.6 million viewers, peaking at 7.9 million.
So will Simon have to eat his hat? Or was it just first-episode-luck for Strictly? Only time will tell…