The Impossible Astronaut had a final consolidated audience figure of 8.86 million viewers, a 43.3% share of the total TV audience, according to figures released by Barb.

The number includes those who recorded the programme for viewing within 7 days of its initial showing. The figure is over two million higher than the initial overnight reported rating. A full report for the week, which will reveal the shows position in the weekly charts will be released by Barb on Tuesday.

The figures do not include those watching on iPlayer, where over 300,000 accessed the programme within the first two days following transmission.

The Impossible Astronaut had roughly the same final audience as other new series openers, excluding those with a new Doctor. New Earth had 8.6 million, Smith And Jones 8.7m and Partners In Crime 9.1 million.

An additional 0.47 million watched the BBC Three repeat on Friday.

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Meanwhile in Australia the show was the fourth watched programme of the day with around 0.86 million viewers in the five capital cities. The rating similar to that achieved by A Christmas Carol, shown on Boxing Day. It was only outranked by news programmes.

5.4 million viewers tuned in to watch Day of the Moon in the UK yesterday, according to unofficial overnight figures.

The rating is a drop of a million on the series opener, not helped by the early timeslot and the sunny weather across the UK for the Bank Holiday weekend. However Doctor Who was still the second most watched programme on British television Saturday Night, with Britain's Got Talent once more topping the charts with 9.5 million. Nothing else on Saturday night achieved more then 5.0 million viewers.

Up against Doctor Who, New People Do the Funniest Things on ITV1 was watched by 1.9 million, up half a million on the programme shown last week.

Doctor Who inherited just 1.7 million viewers from its predecessor, Don't Scare the Hare, which, with an average of just 1.4 million viewers has lost a quarter of its viewers since last week, not surprisingly as the premier show achieved one of the poorest AI scores of all time. Doctor Who's audience peaked at 5.7 million for the last 15 minutes, with the BBC One audience dropping to 2.9 million as the programme finished.

Od the audience, 0.67 million watched on BBCOne HD.

Doctor Who is currently 35th for the week. although this position should change substantially when final figures are released and a top twenty place is still possible.

On BBC Three, Doctor Who Confidential had 0.36 million viewers, with an additional 32,000 watching on BBC HD, a drop of 200,000 on last week, not helped by the gap between the end of Doctor Who on BBC One and the start of Doctor Who Confidential on BBC Three.

Doctor Who: The Impossible Astronaut, scored an Appreciation Index figure of 88, one of the highest figures of the weekend.

The Appreciation Index, or AI figures is a measure of how much the audience enjoyed the programme. It is a score out of 100 based on responses from a 5,000 strong panel.

The score is the joint highest ever received for a series opener, Smith and Jones also scored 88. Last year only two episodes managed a score of 88 or above. Only Lewis on ITV1 scored higher over the weekend, with the show preceding Doctor Who, Don't Scare the Hare receiving one of the lowest scores on record, 46.

In a measure of how successful Doctor Who was over the weekend, no programme on Sunday managed to get more than 6 million watching, including Coronation Street which had 5.9 million viewers; this means Doctor Who remains in 13th position for the week, one which will rise when final figures are released.

David Tennant's performance in United had an audience of 3.2 million on BBC Two/BBC HD.

Doctor Who: The Impossible Astronaut was watched by 6.5 million viewers, according to unofficial overnight figures.

The programme which has a share of 37% of the total audience, was the highest rated show on BBC One for the day, a remarkable achievement given the early timeslot and the excellent bank holiday weather across the UK. It was more than two million viewers ahead of the next programme on BBC One, Casualty.

Overall it was the second highest rated programme on all TV with Britain's Got Talent on ITV1 taking the top slot with 9.5 million watching. Against Doctor Who, March of the Dinosaurs had an average audience of just 1.3 million watching.

To show what a draw Doctor Who is, the programme preceding it had just 1.9 million watching. The BBC One audience jumped from 2.2 to 6.0 million as Doctor Who began, with the audience growing throughout the programme and an average of 7 million watching the final fifteen minutes. At the end of the show, over half of the viewers left BBC One, with the channel seeing its audience plunge from 7.0 million to 3.2 million.

Of the 6.5million viewers watching Doctor Who, 0.76 million watched on BBC HD.

On BBC Three, Doctor Who Confidential had 0.55 million viewers, with an additional 40,000 watching on BBC HD.

On CBBC 0.71 million tuned in for the tribute to Elisabeth Sladen, My Sarah Jane, a 4.1% share of the total audience.

Doctor Who is currently the 13th highest rated show for the week. Final figures, including those who recorded the show and watched it later, will be released next week.

The Impossible Astronaut, the first episode of Doctor Who's sixth series (or thirty-second season, if you prefer) will air tonight at 6:00pm BST on BBC One in the UK, at 9:00pm Eastern (6:00 Pacific) on BBC America in the USA, and at 8:00pm Eastern (5:00pm Pacific) on SPACE in Canada. US viewers will also be able to purchase episodes from iTunes or Amazon Instant Video.

After the episode airs, viewers in the UK will be able to view My Sarah Jane: A Tribute to Elisabeth Sladen on the CBBC channel. Doctor Who Confidential will follow on BBC Three at 7:00pm.

Finally, to tease the final hours before the debut of The Impossible Astronaut, the BBC's Doctor Who website has posted some potentially spoilerrific photos from the episode, as well as this enigmatic video under a link to "The Silence":

The majestic medieval backdrop of Raglan Castle in South East Wales will be the temporary home of the TARDIS throughout this February half-term until Sunday 27 February.

The Welsh Assembly released the news on their website earlier today:

Doctor Who have won in 5 categories at the 2011 SFX Awards.

Matt Smith beat ex Dcotor David Tennant to 'Best Actor'. Smith told SFX:
Karen Gillan won 'Best Actress'. She told SFX:

The show won 'Best TV Show' - which was accepted by Steven Moffat (see a video of his acceptance speech below) - and the 'Sci-Fi Phenomenon Award'.

Other awards for Doctor Who went to Character Options for their Eleven Doctors action figure set, which won 'Best Collectable, Model Or Toy'. Russell Tovey (Midshipman Alonso Frame, Voyage of the Damned and The End of Time, Part Two) won the 'SFX Cult Hero'.

Vincent And The Doctor lost 'Best TV Episode' to the final episode of Ashes to Ashes.

The ceremony took place at the SFX Weekender and the full list of winners and nominees on the night can be found on the SFX website.

Spring will be a bumper season for fans of the Third Doctor with Warner Home Video announcing that both Terror of the Autons and Planet of the Spiders will be released on DVD in the United States and Canada on May 10th.

tvshowsondvd.com report on the two Jon Pertwee stories, details of which were released last month.

The North American release means the stories will be released in the UK during April or the first week of May. Planet of the Spiders, which was the final story for Jon Pertwee, will be released as a standalone story, while Terror of the Autons will be paired with a remastered version of Pertwee's first story, Spearhead from Space.

A release in Australia is also expected shortly after the UK release.

For full details of the global DVD release schedule see our product page.

1.7 million viewers watched the BBC One Bank Holiday repeat of this year's Christmas Special, A Christmas Carol, according to unofficial overnight figures.

The episode, shown at 4.10pm, was watched by 9.5% of the total television audience and was the 42nd most watched programme of the day.

The timeslot was won by Deal or No Deal on Channel 4 with 2.5 million watching.

A Christmas Carol is now back on the BBC iPlayer for an additional 7 days.

Doctor Who: The End of Time, Part One is being offered as a free download as part of iTunes UK's "12 Days of Christmas". The episode, also available in HD, will only be free for 24 hours on 4th January.

Click here to download from iTunes.