Celebrity Traitors finale brings in biggest live UK audience of the year for single TV show

*** Warning: This article contains spoilers for last night’s episode! ***

AN AVERAGE AUDIENCE of over 11 million people tuned into the Celebrity Traitors finale last night on BBC.

It’s the biggest live audience of the year for a single TV show in the UK, and the highest overnight audience since the Gavin and Stacey finale, which attracted 12.3 million on Christmas Day last year.

Some 11.1 million people tuned in last night, though it’s some way behind the biggest UK TV event of the year so far, which was England’s victory in the UEFA Women’s Euro 2025.

Split across both BBC One and ITV, it drew an average audience of 12 million.

And in a finale of twists and turns, it was Traitor Alan Carr who emerged as the winner.

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Fellow Traitor Cat Burns was the first to be banished, followed by a dramatic exit of Faithful Joe Marler.

That left three, and when all the contestants decided to end the game, Carr was crowned the winner.

It was an emotional end to the show, with Carr left in floods of tears.

“It’s been tearing me apart, I’m so sorry,” he said, as he revealed to the remaining Faithfuls that he was, and always had been, a Traitor.

He was consoled by the remaining contestants as well as host Claudia Winkleman, who all said he had dine “brilliantly”.

Carr won the show despite laughing when asked to declare himself as a Traitor and forgetting that he had won a shield that offered him immunity from being “murdered”.

“Most awful traitor ever being the best traitor ever,” is how one user summed it up on X.

The celebrity contestants were playing for charity and Carr’s chosen charity was Neuroblastoma UK, which funds research to develop treatments for children with neuroblastoma.

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Neuroblastoma is a type of cancer that forms in certain types of nerve tissue.

The final prize pot Carr won for his chosen charity was £87,500, close to €100,000.

Neuroblastoma UK said it “adored watching Carr over the last three weeks” and that the charity is beyond grateful.

Carr has been a patron of the charity for close to a decade and a spokesperson said Carr’s “commitment, compassion and drive to bring hope to children and families facing this aggressive cancer have been nothing short of transformational”.

On the BBC podcast for the series titled Uncloaked, Paloma Faith, who was murdered in plain sight by Carr, remarked that “most people didn’t vote for [Carr] because, how can you vote for someone who is so loveable?”

While is appeared initially as though Carr might struggle as a Traitor, he quickly grew into the role and summed up the experience in last night’s finale:

“I started this game a bit of a nervous wreck. I’ve thrown some really good friends under the bus, I’ve murdered national treasures in plain sight. I’m clearly a better liar and traitor than I thought I was.”

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