WEDNESDAY: The Great British Bake Off returned with a whopping high of 11m viewers – eclipsing the previous series opener.

GBBO

The Great British Bake Off (BBC1) 8pm-9pm
10.5m (47.5%)

Love Productions juggernaut showed no sign of slowing as the seventh series debut scored a near 50% share of the audience.

The episode was comfortably ahead of the 9.3m (43%) who tuned in to last year’s opener – which peaked with 10m (44.5%) – and decimated BBC1’s slot average of 5m (24.1%) for the previous 12 months.

The 2014 series got underway with 7.2m (34.6%), according to Barb data provided by overnights.tv.

GBBO was followed by The Chronicles of Nadiya across the 9pm hour. The former Bake Off winner’s food format pulled in 4.2m (20.5%) to win the slot.

Long Lost Family was next in line at 9pm with a steady 3.3m (16.1%) on ITV, while Celebrity Big Brother continued with 1.8m (8.8%).

Elsewhere at 9pm, Minnow Films one-off Channel 4 drama The Watchman gripped 1.5m (7.2%), ahead of the 1.3m (6.6%) who tuned in for Skies Above Britain on BBC2.

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