The celebrity family history programme, which this week featured 'Poirot' actor David Suchet, hogged a 27.4% share of viewing at 9-10pm, leaving ITV1 and Channel 4 to fight it out for the remaining audience.
Channel 4's 'The Family' debuted with 2.7m viewers and an 11.5% share at 9-10pm, with another 301,000 viewers catching it on Channel 4+1.
The eight-part series condenses four months' worth of filming via 21 cameras fitted into the Canterbury home of the Hughes family - Jane and Simon, their daughters Emily, Jessica and Charlotte and son Tom.
ITV1 just had the edge, as 2.9m tuned in for the third part of time travel/costume drama combination 'Lost in Austen', giving the channel a 12.2% share. However, the audience is down from 3.1m and 13.6% last week despite last night's episode having its wet shirt Darcy moment. The fourth and concluding installment airs next Wednesday.
BBC Two drew 1.5m (6.3%) for 'Dawn Gets Naked', a programme previously aired on BBC Three in which writer and journalist Dawn Porter examines the female form.
Earlier at 8-9pm the second helping of the Raymond Blanc culinary competition 'The Restaurant' fell to 1.8m viewers (8.1%) from 2.3m last week.
From 9-11pm Five screened action horror movie 'Resident Evil: Apocalypse', which managed 879,000 viewers and a 4.2% share.
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