More than 11 million viewers saw the climax to Chelsea's 2-1 win over Liverpool in the biggest-rating FA Cup final since 2007.

With its audience boosted by a 5.15pm kick-off – later than its traditional 3pm start time – FA Cup Final Live had 5.45 million viewers, a 32% share, between 3.15pm and 7.45pm on ITV1.

Live match coverage averaged 8.9 million viewers, with a 15-minute peak of 10.4 million between 6.45pm and 7pm and a five-minute peak of 11.21 million.

It was the highest audience for the final since Chelsea's 1-0 over Manchester United in 2007, when it was still broadcast on BBC1, which had a match average of 9.9 million viewers and a 15-minute peak of 11.5 million.

The FA Cup switched sides after the 2008 final, the last to be broadcast on BBC1.

ITV's audience has grown steadily since, with match averages of 5.3 million in 2009, 5.6 million in 2010 and 6.8 million last year.

This year's final was the first to eclipse the last on BBC1 in 2008, which had a live match average of 7.3 million.

The FA Cup final was also broadcast on ESPN, which had 397,000 viewers, a 2% share, for its coverage of the final from 4.45pm.

Last year's final, Manchester City's 1-0 win over Stoke, averaged 4.3 million (34.9%) with a match average of 6.8 million and a peak of 8.3 million.

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BBC4's The Bridge had 797,000 viewers, a 3.2% share, for its fifth episode, and 632,000 viewers (3.1%) for the sixth which followed immediately after it.

It was a further dip on the third and fourth episodes, which had 788,000 and 693,000 viewers respectively last Saturday.

All ratings are Barb overnight figures, including live, +1 (except for BBC and some other channels including Sky1) and same day timeshifted (recorded) viewing, but excluding on demand, or other – unless otherwise stated. Figures for BBC1, ITV1, Channel 4 and Channel 5 generally include ratings for their HD simulcast services, unless otherwise stated

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