Carrying on the trend from February, the most anticipated TV premieres of March 2026 are dominated by the busy schedules for sports and awards seasons, though there are still plenty of brand-new series launching as well. In partnership with predictive media analytics company Diesel Labs, ScreenRant has exclusive data revealing TV titles generating the greatest chatter before their premieres. Each release is given a hype score, measured by online engagement.
March’s most-hyped new TV shows, specials, and broadcasts are ranked by Attention Signals, which are calculated through measures such as likes, shares, comments, and views on social and video channels like Facebook and YouTube. This data helps glean valuable insight into which TV releases are making the biggest impact on prospective viewers before their launch on the small screen.
The attention scale metric is the percentage of attention based on the show or movie in the number one spot (which is represented as 100%).
Excluding the returns of established series like Outlander season 8 and Netflix’s One Piece season 2, March is set to bring some high-profile TV releases that may continue to yield more hype for weeks to come. In addition to the 2026 Actor Awards and March Madness, the month’s biggest TV series include a new Yellowstone spinoff and HBO dramedy. Per the data revealed by Diesel Labs to ScreenRant, March 2026’s most anticipated new TV releases form a difficult-to-beat packed lineup.
Top 10 Most Anticipated New TV Releases – March 2026
Title
Premiere Date
Platform
Genre
Attention Signals
Attention Scale
2026 Men’s NCAA March Madness Tournament
3/17/2026
CBS, TBS, TNT
Sports
4,410,067,489
100.00%
2026 Women’s NCAA March Madness Tournament
3/18/2026
ABC, ESPN, ESPN2
Sports
458,548,704
10.40%
Paralympic Games 2026
3/6/2026
NBC
Sports
456,045,729
10.34%
2026 iHeartRadio Music Awards
3/26/2026
Fox
Special
166,745,366
3.78%
3/1/2026
HBO
Comedy
52,253,433
1.18%
3/1/2026
CBS
Drama
44,799,258
1.02%
3/25/2026
Amazon, Prime Video
Comedy
38,469,676
0.87%
3/11/2026
Amazon, Prime Video
Thriller
22,522,349
0.51%
3/8/2026
HBO
Comedy
20,972,114
0.48%
32nd Actor Awards Presented by SAG-AFTRA
3/1/2026
Netflix
Special
20,662,827
0.47%
Diesel Labs’ data reveals that the most anticipated TV release of March 2026 is this year’s Men’s NCAA March Madness Tournament, with the next most-hyped title being the women’s tournament. The classic college basketball tournaments kick off in mid-March before the championship games commence in early April. Following close behind in online chatter is the Paralympic Games in 2026, which will take place from March 6 until March 15 in Milan and Cortina.
The month’s most buzzed-about TV events also include the Fox-broadcasted 2026 iHeartRadio Music Awards, with this year’s top-nominated artists including Taylor Swift, Sabrina Carpenter, and Bad Bunny. Among the new March 2026 TV shows leading online social engagement are HBO’s Jason Bateman and David Harbour-starring dark comedy DTF St. Louis, CBS’s Kayce Dutton-focused Yellowstone spinoff series Marshals, and the Riz Ahmed-led genre-bending comedy Bait on Prime Video.
Furthermore, the Nicole Kidman-starring thriller series Scarpetta and Steve Carell-led HBO comedy Rooster have made waves with prospective audiences online ahead of their March debuts. Rounding out the month’s top 10 most anticipated TV releases is the 32nd Actor Awards Presented by SAG-AFTRA, which will air live on Netflix on March 1.
While half of March 2026’s top anticipated releases on the small screen are related to sports, music, and awards specials, this trend will begin to die down throughout the spring. There are only a few key sports tournament broadcasts in April, while the film and TV awards season will see a sharp decline after the 2026 Oscars next month. Meanwhile, there are plenty more brand-new TV shows and franchise spinoffs to come over the next few months that are likely to dominate the cultural conversation.
Diesel Labs is a Content Intelligence company that produces audience insights for the entire media landscape. With a sophisticated machine-learning based approach, they measure millions of audience members’ attention with content across many sources including major social and video platforms YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok (beta), and Reddit (beta). For more information, visit www.diesellabs.com.
