The Great British Bake Off last night secured its biggest audience share for an opening episode since moving to Channel 4, as legions of fans tuned in to watch 13 amateur bakers kick off this year's contest.
Channel 4 confirmed that series 10's opener, broadcast at 8-9.30pm on Tuesday, raked in an audience share of 30.6%, higher than last year's launch episode, which achieved a share of 29.4%.
Despite the unseasonably hot weather in huge swathes of the country, the show gained an average overnight audience of 5.7 million and a peak audience of 6.6 million.
This was slightly lower than 2018's opening episode, which was 75 minutes long and drew in an average audience of six million and a peak of seven million.
The programme format comprised five centre breaks, each four minutes long, including spots, promos and sponsorship idents – one more than in a standard 75-minute episode.
All remaining episodes of this series, which is the third to air on Channel 4 since GBBO moved from the BBC, will run for 75 minutes, with four centre breaks.
Amazon is sponsoring the show for a second year. In its first year on the commercial broadcaster, GBBO was sponsored by Dr Oetker and Lyle’s Golden Syrup.
