Doctor Who and The X Factor lose viewers

(Image credit: BBC/Adrian Rogers)

BBC1’s big entertainment shows struggled with viewers on Saturday, September 13, with the final of celebrity gymnastics show, Tumble, pulling in an average of just 2.7 million viewers.

And Doctor Who drew one of it lowest audiences yet, with an audience of 4.8 million viewers.

It wasn’t good news for ITV, either, as The X Factor continued to shed viewers. Saturday’s show, the first of the Wembley Arena auditions, had an average of 8.5 million, which is 200,000 down on the previous week. The launch edition two weeks earlier had pulled in 9.5 million.

It is also down on the equivalent show in 2013 which had an average audience of 9.1 million.

But the Saturday night episode was still the most watched programme of the night - claiming a peak of 9.9 million.

The X Factor is to go head-to-head with the Strictly Come Dancing launch show on September 26 after ITV scheduled a Friday edition of their programme.

Strictly has already claimed first blood this year when its curtain-raiser episode on Sunday, September 7 - in which the celebs were introduced to their dancing partners - was 800,000 viewers ahead when the two programmes clashed.