‘Pretty Little Liars’ Series Finale Ratings Rise Over 2016, Dominates Social Media

After seven seasons, last night’s Pretty Little Liars series finale on Freeform finally revealed who the mysterious blackmailing A.D. was and the I. Marlene King-created drama went out with a rare ratings rise.

Unlike many series nowadays, the two-hour final episode “Till Death Do Us Part” saw not only an uptick week-to-week but also year-to-year. Surging up 75% among adults 18-49 from its June 20  penultimate episode “Farewell, My Lovely,” the King-directed finale snagged 1.4 million viewers. That’s the second-most watched PLL of the season after the Season 7 opener of June 21, 2016.

Speaking of last year, Tuesday’s series finale written by King and Maya Goldsmith was up 17% in the 18-49 demo over its Season 6 “Hush, Hush, Sweet Liars” finale of March 15, 2016. That’s actually an 18-month demo high for the series starring Troian Bellisario, Ashley Benson, Lucy Hale, Shay Mitchell and Sasha Pieterse, which also saw an 18% viewership rise from last year’s season ender.

Overall, PLL was the second-biggest show on cable last night after USA Network’s WWE SmackDown, which pinned a 0.8 rating and 2.6 million viewers

Of course, ratings are only part of the audience reaction story when it comes to the social media-strong Pretty Little Liars. With 1.7 million tweets around the world last night, Tuesday’s finale is the most-tweeted TV episode of 2017 so far. Over all of Tuesday, with its Season 7 marathon on Freeform before the finale, PLL scored 4.9 million engagements on social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook.