Beijing residents watch a live broadcast of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic competitions on an 8K monitor, the biggest in the capital, outside the Dang Dai Mall in Haidian district on February 10, 2022. Photo: VCG

The solidarity, cooperation and hope demonstrated by the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics are injecting confidence and strength in countries around the world, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said Monday. His comments come as International Olympic Committee officials and Games broadcasters said that the Beijing 2022 has set record viewership numbers around the world, making it the most streamed Winter Olympics ever. 

Wang said the Games have not only drawn attention from Europe and the US, but also from people in tropical countries, which indicates that despite the pandemic, the passion, joy and friendship brought by winter sports are shared by people all over the world. 

Wang said that people around the world cheer for the Winter Olympics and Beijing, a testament of 'together for a shared future,' which is the full embodiment of the Olympic spirit. Although some media claimed that many are not watching the Games and reports from some networks that the opening ceremony of the Olympics had low viewership, IOC officials and some broadcasters said the opposite.

The International Olympic Committee spokesperson Mark Adams said at Sunday's media briefing that the Beijing 2022 had received record viewership across the world.

"In China, up to Friday 11, 2.05 billion hours of Beijing 2022 coverage were watched on TV, and that's 15 percent more hours viewed than the whole of PyeongChang 2018 and Sochi 2014 put together. In the US, NBC said the Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022 are the most streamed Olympic Winter Games ever with 2.23 billion minutes consumed," said Adams.

A record number of viewers are watching the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, Yiannis Exarchos, CEO of Olympic Broadcasting Services (OBS), said on Thursday.

The number of people watching the Games on the official website olympics.com has exceeded 45 million, more than the entire run of the 2018 edition in PyeongChang. OBS is delivering 6,000 hours of content, the most ever for the Olympic Winter Games, olympic.com reported. 

Global Times