The premiere of season 5 of Offspring attracted 929,000 viewers in the five capital cities and 1.17 million nationally on Wednesday night, winning its timeslot.
Network Ten said that was 7% higher in all people and up 15% in women compared to the 2013 launch episode.
The Endemol Australia produced drama beat Seven's The Blacklist and Nine's US sitcom Mom, benefitting from a solid lead-in from Shine Australia's MasterChef Australia, which had 891,000 viewers in the capitals and 1.17 million nationally.
Ten had its biggest prime time audience in 25-to-54s, under 55s and women for the 2014 survey to date. The network reported MasterChef Australia had 1.53 million video views on tenplay between May 7 and May 14.
The new series of Offspring follows Asher Keddie’s Nina Proudman as she cares for her baby daughter and puts her life back together six months after Patrick's death.
“We said recently if TV can ever successfully tackle the tougher issues then this is the show to do it,” Ten’s head of drama Rick Maier told IF before the premiere.
“Grief is real and we all go through it, but it's pretty much almost glossed over. It will be fascinating to see how the audience responds, but I suspect they will be as engaged as we are. Where there's life, and especially new life, there has to be hope.
“As dislocated and disturbed as the Proudmans are generally, I think we all kind of wish we had that kind of support ourselves. Plenty of tears, but lots of laughs and we hope major rewards for an incredibly devoted audience."