Gayle King’s space flight launches ‘CBS Mornings’ to first place Monday

Co-anchor Gayle King’s trip into space helped move “CBS Mornings” into an impressive rare first-place finish Monday, April 14, 2025.

The show hit around 3.952 million viewers, according to figures from Nielsen Media Research released by CBS, and also finished first in the adults 25-54 demo.

The average viewership numbers across the entire program were enough to put “Mornings” ahead of top-rated “Good Morning America” on ABC by 1.32 million and 1.42 million viewers ahead of NBC’s “Today.”

On any given day, “Today” and “GMA” will typically hover around 3 million total viewers, while “Mornings” will typically come in around 2 million, meaning CBS was able to come close to doubling its audience with the King flight coverage.

The last time “Mornings” beat ABC and NBC was March 8, 2021, when the broadcast aired an Oprah Winfrey interview with Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, which was another high-interest segment.

While only time will tell if “Mornings” is able to hold onto its audience for the long term, high-profile segments such as King’s flight often ultimately become an anomaly. 

In the past, CBS’s morning newscast has similarly seen ratings boosts or wins on select days despite traditionally being in third place, such as when “Survivor” finalists guest on the broadcast.

In addition to King, the all-female crew included journalist and philanthropist Lauren Sánchez, film producer Kerianne Flynn, former NASA scientist Aisha Boweand civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen. The women flew aboard a craft developed by Blue Origin, an aerospace company launched by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. 

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From launch to landing, King’s flight lasted about 10 minutes, including time spent above the Kármán Line, which sits at 100 kilometers, or 62 miles, above sea level, and is widely recognized as the “border” between earth’s atmosphere and what scientists consider space.