The X Factor ratings are down quite a lot on last year – despite new panel

Freshening up The X Factor panel has once again failed to revive the ratings – and in fact they’re quite a way down on this time last year.

The show’s first Saturday outing represented a slight downturn on the equivalent episode from 2017, and the Sunday drop was even worse.

Aired at 8pm, the talent show had 5 million viewers – down 700,000 on Saturday and down a whole 1.5 million on the first Sunday broadcast from 2017. Somewhere, Nicole Scherzinger is cackling.

The most-watched programme of the night was Bodyguard, which annihilated Vanity Fair on ITV with 6.7 million viewers and a peak of 7 million.

Vanity Fair, by contrast, had 3.1 million; and the latest Celebrity Big Brother – also on at 9pm – had 1.4 million.

It’s a shame that X Factor’s numbers have already dropped so much: Ayda Field, for example, sounds like a shite choice for a judge but she actually does very well in the format, and Robbie Williams is a breath of fresh air and a long-overdue replacement for Louis Walsh.

The X Factor is back on Saturday at 8pm.