BBC3's Torchwood pulled ahead of Sky One's Lost in the big digital multichannel ratings battle last night, according toMedia Guardian.

The 10pm slot saw Torchwood being watched by 971,000 viewers, while big US import Lost attracted only 863,000 viewers. This was the first showing in the UK for both episodes.

The final rating released this week by the BARB for Love & Monsters, episode ten of the new seasons, shows that 6.66 million viewers tuned into the episode, an increase of approximately 400,000 viewers as compared to the original overnight ratings reports. This places Doctor Who in fifteenth place for the week behind six World Cup events, five episodes of Coronation Street, EastEnders, Heartbeat and the Thursday night ITV Evening News. (Thanks to 'Shaun Lyon,' Andy Parish, Keith Armstrong)

Despite another day of fine weather in the UK, last night's Fear Her saw an increase in audience figures to 6.64 million viewers, up from last week's 6.22 million for "Love & Monsters", according to the unofficial overnights. The episode peaked at 7.1 million in its last quarter of an hour and 7.58 million in its final five minutes, and attracted an average share of 39.7% to comfortably win its timeslot against ITV1's Who Wants to be a Millionaire (3.6m, 21.4%). The end of the episode and the start of the following sports coverage saw 3.37m switch off BBC One. The World Cup football match that followed had an average audience of 8.1m, but its much higher peak audience and extra time appears to have carried over a large audience of 6.9m for the late-running lottery results, leaving Doctor Who in third place for the day. (It's likely that the final BARB figures will discount the lottery show, as it runs for less than 15 minutes, so Doctor Who may achieve second place for the day.) On the currently available overnight figures, "Fear Her" was in 14th place for the week across television; when ratings are in for Sunday's World Cup matches, the show will certainly slip down this chart one or two places, but a top 20 position stil looks very likely. Among under-16s, 61% of children and teenagers watching television in that timeslot were watching Doctor Who, amounting to 1.3m, against 145,000 who were watching Who Wants to be a Millionaire.

On BBC Three, the eleventh episode of Doctor Who Confidential at 7.45pm was watched by 500,700 (3.8%), making it the top-rated multichannel programme on Saturday, while Totally Doctor Who 11 last Thursday benefitted from the preceding football match to get its highest rating so far of 1.5m.

Meanwhile, television promotion for Army of Ghosts began last night with a 50-second trailer on BBC One at 11.09pm, delayed from 10.45pm by the World Cup. The trailer is a slightly shorter edit of the 'Next time' preview shown at the climax of Fear Her. It can be seen online at the official site by following the 'Video' link at the foot of its homepage. (Thanks to 'Shaun Lyon,' Andy Parish)

The final rating released this week by the BARB for The Satan Pit, episode nine of the new seasons, stands at 6.08m. This is Doctor Who's lowest consolidated rating since its return last year, although the episode remains in the top 20 for the week at number 19 and was also the week's ninth placed individual programme.

Meanwhile, last Saturday's 6.23 million viewer overnight ratings/38.33% share for Love & Monsters (the detail on the numbers coming from Broadcast magazine) places the episode in 15th place in the week's chart. (This is likely to drop when the BARB figures are released next week, since live football coverage counted as one programme in the overnights will be divided into separate match/pre-match/post-match "programmes" in the final chart.) The BBC3 Sunday repeat of the episode is at No. 4 in the multichannel chart for the week, just behind Saturday's Doctor Who Confidential at No. 3, with the Cut Down Confidential from Sunday appearing at No. 22.

This week's early evening reruns on BBC Three of episodes 6, 7 and 8 were watched by 168,800 (1.2%), 149,500 (1.0%) and 158,500 (1.2%), according to the overnight results. (Thanks to 'Shaun Lyon,' Andy Parish, Keith Armstrong)

A brief update on ratings for various Doctor Who related programmes this weekend. Saturday night's installment ofDoctor Who Confidential at 7.45pm on BBC3 was watched by 747,400 viewers, with a 5.9% audience share; it was followed at 8.15pm by a repeat installment of "Confidential" (episode three from this season) which was viewed by 402,200 viewers with a 3.0% audience share.

On Sunday night, the BBC3 repeat of Love & Monsters was seen by 700,000 viewers, with a 5.2% share, followed immediately by the repeat of Saturday night's "Confidential" in "Cut Down" edition, viewed by 519,000 viewers (3% share). The Sunday episode repeat was the day's most watched programme on non-terrestrial/satellite channels.

The audience appreciation index (AI) figure for "Love & Monsters" was reported at 76... a low for the season by tied with the first season's "Rose" and "The End of the World".

Ratings for Love & Monsters, the eleventh episode of the new season, are in: according to the overnight viewing figures, 6.22 million people tuned in to see the episode, with a total audience share of 38.3%. The episode was Saturday's #1 most watched program in the UK in terms of number of viewers, though the episode was second on the list in total audience share (World Cup Match of the Day Live, which aired much earlier in the day, had a 38.9% share but only 3.1 million viewers at that time.) As usual, individual ratings on the five-minute period charts show the episode peaked at 7.15 million viewers in the final five minutes of the episode. The episode was also #12 on the list of most watched programmes for the week, after episodes of "Coronation Street," "EastEnders" and several instances of World Cup programming (including, so far, the week's top rated England v. Trinidad & Tobago match on Thursday.) More details later. (Thanks to 'Shaun Lyon' and Andy Parish)

Ratings for the broadcast of the first season finale on the Sci Fi Channel, The Parting of the Ways, in America are in: the telecast scored a 1.14 household rating with an average of 1.4 million viewers. According to Outpost Gallifrey's source at the Sci Fi Channel, the first full season of the series averaged a 1.26 household rating, with an average audience of 1.5 million views. (Some other statistics for the season: the audience was 63% male, with a median age of 46 years, and scored a 1.00 rating in men ages 18-49 and a 0.62 rating in men 18-34.)

Though the ratings for the broadcast of the first series seem to have been lower than expected, that now doesn't appear to be the case. As reported at the Sci Fi Channel's own news service, Sci Fi Wire, "the new updated Doctor Who boosted SCI FI Channel's ratings on Friday nights by double digits, the network reported. The new version of Doctor Who, produced by the BBC, wrapped its first season on SCI FI on June 9. Doctor Who averaged a 1.3 household rating and 1.5 million total viewers in its 9 p.m. Friday timeslot, a 44 percent increase in ratings and a 54 percent increase in viewership over the same timeslot in the second quarter last year. In key demographics, Doctor Who averaged 778,000 viewers aged 18-49, a 57 percent increase over 2005, and 942,000 viewers aged 25-54, a 56 percent increase." The Futon Critic, a respected source of industry and media news noted the "double-digit ratings growth this quarter on Fridays from 9pm to 10pm versus the time period last year," referring to the fact that Doctor Who was a broadcast original for the network in a time period (March to June) when it normally shows reruns. (Until this series broadcast, Sci Fi's original Friday night series -- Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis and Battlestar Galactica -- broadcast in two halves, July through September for the first half of each season, and then January to March for the second half.)

What does this mean for Series Two? A pop-culture website called ICV2 today stated that "The second season will kick off in the U.S. on Sci Fi Channel in October." However, this appears to be simple speculation on the part of the website; Sci Fi has not announced any plans to purchase the second season of the series at this time, although it's a foregone conclusion that if it did, October would be a likely timeframe for it to be shown (as the Stargate shows end their half-season runs in September, while Galactica returns in October, presumably in its regular 10pm timeslot... with, theoretically, space for Doctor Who to run before each new episode at 9pm.) Outpost Gallifrey will keep you posted.

The final ratings for The Impossible Planet, broadcast a week ago Saturday, have been announced by the BARB: adjusted for time-shifted viewing, Doctor Who scored 6.32 million viewers, to be ranked #18 for the week in total series viewings and #8 in weekly series (allowing for multiple episodes of shows), after "Coronation Street" (which held the top ratings slot for the week of only 9.56 million viewers; all shows were skewed downward in total viewers with the onset of summer), "Match of the Day Live," "EastEnders," "New Tricks," "Heartbeat," "Emmerdale" and "Casualty".

In other ratings news: Doctor Who was first on BBC3 for the week ending 4 June, with the Sunday 4 June airing of "The Impossible Planet" scoring 689,000 viewers according to the BARB timeshifts, which also scored seventh on the list of total non-terrestial channel broadcasts for the week. The Saturday night broadcast of "Doctor Who Confidential" was second for the week on BBC3 with 551,000 viewers; the Friday night 2 June repeat of "The Idiot's Lantern" was fifth with 416,000 viewers; and Sunday night 4 June's repeat of "Confidential" was seventh on BBC3's list for the week with 393,000 viewers. (Thanks to 'Shaun Lyon')