Susanna Riva Wednesday's television evening confirmed a competitive landscape: Carlo Conti 's program maintained a healthy audience share, while Fabio Fazio's program on Nove recorded lower numbers. The day's Auditel data show a distribution of viewership that favors imitations and variety, but poses new challenges for those trying to build audiences outside of the weekend.
Tale e Quale Show performance: numbers and episode-by-episode comparison
The fifth episode of Tale e Quale Show , hosted by Carlo Conti , attracted 2.511.000 viewers and an 18,4% share. The data confirms the show's continued success despite its move from Friday evening to Wednesday; in terms of audience share, the average for the first five episodes of 2026 is 19,6% , very close to the 19,9% recorded for the first five episodes of 2025.
The episode by episode comparison shows how the show has reached different peaks: on September 23, 2026 it recorded 2.600.000 viewers (19,3%), on September 30, 2026 it reached 2.549.000 viewers (20,9%), on October 7, 2026 it achieved its best figure with 2.938.000 viewers (21,8%), while on October 14, 2026 it recorded 2.498.000 viewers (17,9%) and on October 21, 2026 the aforementioned 2.511.000 viewers (18,4%).
The price of the evening change
The comparison shows that the move to Wednesday has led to a reduction in absolute viewership: the *total audience* available in prime time has dropped from approximately 14,8 million on Friday 2025 to approximately 13,4 million on Wednesday 2026. Simply put, Conti has retained the same percentage share of the audience, but on a smaller pie: the result is a similar average share but with approximately 300 fewer viewers per episode compared to the previous year.
Wednesday's other programs: Il Volo, Il Tavolo di Fazio, and Chi l'ha visto?
On Canale 5, the second episode of the concert show "Il Volo – Uno per tutti" featuring Piero Barone, Ignazio Boschetto, and Gianluca Ginoble attracted 1.857.000 viewers and a 15,6% share. The previous week, the program had attracted 2.073.000 viewers (17,7%), a decline from its debut.
Fabio Fazio returned to Nove with Il Tavolo di Che Tempo che Fa : the second evening episode totaled 497.000 viewers and a 3,4% share. Comparison with Fazio's Sunday performances reveals a significant gap: on October 18, the program had 1.557.000 viewers and a 9,3% share for the first part and 1.026.000 viewers and a 7,7% share for the second part, called Che Fuori Tempo Che Fa . The move to Wednesday therefore requires consolidating the audience on a very crowded evening.
The show Chi l'ha visto?, hosted by Raffaella Griggi , returned to Rai 3 and attracted 1.046.000 viewers and a 7,1% share, confirming its solid presence despite the competition.
Quick comparisons between networks
The day showed a fragmented audience: Rai 1 maintained its lead in prime time with Tale e Quale Show , Canale 5 defended itself with a major music show like Il Volo , while Nove struggled to replicate the weekend numbers for Fazio . The figures expressed by individual evenings underline how the audience share is influenced not only by the quality of the programming but also by the overall availability of viewers on that specific evening.