The enormous success of the show and the revenue it generated was transformative for Fox Broadcasting Company. American Idol and fellow competing shows Survivor and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire were altogether credited for expanding reality television programming in the United States in the 1990s and 2000s, and Idol became the most watched non-scripted primetime television series for almost a decade, from 2003 to 2012, breaking records on U.S. television (dominated by drama shows and sitcoms in the preceding decades).

For how many years was American Idol the highest rated reality show on television?