Flying start for Big Brother 8

The eighth series of Big Brother launched with 6.2 million viewers last night, eclipsing The Apprentice and the British Soap Awards with a 26% share of the audience.

Last night's arrival of 11 female housemates for this year's reality TV series attracted a peak of 8 million viewers, or a 35% share, in the last 15 minutes of its run between 9pm and 10.15pm, according to unofficial overnights

Big Brother's healthy launch figures suggest Channel 4 has escaped serious fallout from last week's damning Ofcom report about alleged racism and bullying on Celebrity Big Brother in January.

Channel 4 won the ratings battle in the 9pm slot, averaging 5.8 million viewers and a 23% share in the hour up to 10pm

ITV1's British Soap awards averaged 5.7 million and 23% in the 9pm hour, while on BBC1 The Apprentice had 4.8 million and 19%, the third lowest audience of its 10-week run.

Last night's audience for Big Brother was down on last year, however, when 7 million viewers and 31% tuned in for the first night - the highest audience for a launch show.

Big Brother also gave Desperate Housewives a boost, as the US drama added 1.2 million viewers and eight share points on last week to post 3.2 million and a 19% share between 10.15pm and 11.20pm last night for its third series finale.

The Apprentice's 4.8 million audience was up 100,000 on last week, when it suffered from competition with the Champions League final, but still 1 million down on its series high two weeks ago.

So far the business reality show has averaged 5.2 million and a 22% share for its first series on BBC1.

BBC2 spinoff The Apprentice: You're Fired!, which interviewed axed candidate Naomi Lay, had an audience of 2.4 million, an 11% share, at 10pm.

Across the whole two-hour run of the British Soap Awards, ITV1 enjoyed an audience of 6.2 million, a 26% share.

The audience for the first hour between 8pm and 9pm easily won the slot, with 6.7 million viewers and a 30% share.

BBC1 won a three-way battle for second place at 8pm, with the return of car crime documentary Traffic Cops pulling in 4.2 million or 19%.

Last night's instalment of Springwatch had 3.3 million viewers, a 15% share for BBC2, down from 3.8 million on its Monday night launch and 3.6 million on Tuesday.

Channel 4's Property Ladder recovered from last week's football-related dip, adding 300,000 viewers to record a 2.7 million audience, a 12% share.

Over on Channel Five, the first episode of Trisha Goddard's Families at War debuted with just 300,000 viewers, a 1% share of the audience between 8pm and 9pm.

ITV1's comedy pilot about an Indian call centre, Mumbai Calling, was watched by only 1.9 million, a 9% share, in the half hour from 10pm.

Earlier on the channel, Emmerdale had 7.1 million and 39% at 7pm, followed by the best audience of the night for Coronation Street, with 9.7 million and 48%.

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