Marking a Somber Anniversary of the September 11 Attacks, ABC News’ 9/11 Special, Anchored by David Muir, Robin Roberts and Diane Sawyer, Draws Over 4 Million Total Viewers

As the nation marked a somber anniversary, ABC News’ “9/11 Tribute in Light: Live from Lower Manhattan” in partnership with the 9/11 Memorial & Museum ranked as the No. 1 program of the night in Total Viewers (4.379 million) as well as the No. 1 non-sports program of the night in Adults 25-54 (802,000) and Adults 18-49 (559,000). The ABC News special, simulcast across ABC, Disney+, Hulu, National Geographic, ABC Owned Television Stations livestreams and ABC News Live, was led by “World News Tonight” anchor David Muir, “Good Morning America” co-anchor Robin Roberts and anchor Diane Sawyer.

• Head-to-head from 8-9 p.m., “9/11 Tribute in Light: Live from Lower Manhattan” (4.379 million) more than doubled the performance of CBS News’ “9/11: We Remember” (+112%; vs. 2.068 million), while nearly tripling the encore of NBC’s “America’s Got Talent” (+184%; vs. 1.541 million). In fact, “9/11 Tribute in Light: Live from Lower Manhattan” beat the combined deliveries of its CBS and NBC competition in the hour (+21% – 4.379 million vs. 3.609 million).

• “9/11 Tribute in Light: Live from Lower Manhattan” (4.379 million) ranked No. 3 among all ABC News specials (excluding political) since January 2022, behind only “The Mystery of Richard Simmons – A Diane Sawyer Special” (5/12/26) and “Matthew Perry – The Diane Sawyer Interview” (10/28/22), respectively.

• An encore of “9/11: United We Stand – 25 Years Later” (9-11 p.m.) on ABC and ABC News Live ranked as the No. 2 program of the night in Total Viewers, behind only the “9/11 Tribute In Light” lead-in. In addition, “9/11: United We Stand – 25 Years Later” grew over its initial telecast (9/1/26) by double digits across the board: Total Viewers (+18% – 3.108 million vs. 2.626 million), Adults 25-54 (+12% – 583,000 vs. 520,000) and Adults 18-49 (+12% – 396,000 vs. 354,000). 

Source: Nielsen National Live+Same Day Big Data Plus Panel Program Ratings for 9/11/26.

*COPYRIGHT ©2026 American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. All photography is copyrighted material and is for editorial use only. Images are not to be archived, altered, duplicated, resold, retransmitted or used for any other purposes without written permission of ABC News. Images are distributed to the press in order to publicize current programming. Any other usage must be licensed.

Media Contacts

You must be logged in to view this content. Please log in or create an account.