'Dancing With the Stars' Season 35 Premiere Hits 6.7 Million Viewers, Best Opener in Six Years

"Dancing With the Stars" returned to ABC for its Season 35 premiere on Tuesday night and reached a strong 6.7 million viewers.

That's a 24% increase from the performance of the Season 34 premiere, which hit 5.4 million viewers in 2025. Even more, Tuesday's episode marks the series' best opener in six years, since Season 29 launched with 8.1 million viewers in 2020.

Season 35 also improved by 40% on last year's rating among adults 18-49, jumping from a 1.06 to 1.48 — the best-rated "Dancing With the Stars" premiere since 2017. Season 35 also improved by 40% on last year's rating among adults 18-49, jumping from a 1.06 to 1.48 — the best-rated "Dancing With the Stars" premiere since 2017. blogherads.adq.push(function () { blogherads .defineSlot( 'medrec', 'gpt-variety-article-mid-article-uid0' ) .setTargeting( 'pos', ["mid-article1","mid-articleX","mid","mid-article"] ) .setTargeting( 'viewable', 'yes' ) .setSubAdUnitPath("ros\/mid-article") .addSize([[300,250],[2,2],[300,251],[2,4],[4,2],[320,480],[620,366]]) .setClsOptimization("minsize") ; });

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