Oscars ceremony begins on ABC at 7 p.m. Eastern and streams live on Hulu + Live TV for the first time this year. The ceremony, [hosted by comedian Conan O’Brien](

Oscars air tonight at 7 p.m. ET on ABC. Expect surprises, first-time winners, and a tight Best Picture race. Follow Newsweek's live blog.

The Oscars dropped nearly 8% to 18 million viewers Sunday, the first year-to-year decline for the ABC telecast since 2021. The decrease is hardly a shock, as the majority of this year’s Oscars contenders were not box office hits, including “Anora,” which won for best picture and four other trophies.

Just under 18.1 million people tuned into ABC’s telecast of the 97th Academy Awards on Sunday, marking a 7% decrease from the year before. That total, which comes from a combination of Nielsen’s measurement of linear viewers on ABC plus Disney’s own data regarding livestreams on Hulu,

Oscars brought in an impressive audience, though not as big as last year. The 97th annual Academy Awards scored 18.07 million viewers across ABC and Hulu, according to Nielsen live-plus-same-day figures.