Media mogul Bonang Matheba is on cloud nine after broadcaster SABC reported that her latest reality show had broken viewership records.

A Very Bonang Year, based in part on her time in the US last year, debuted on SABC1 last weekend, reaching more than 1.8 million viewers.

“We are excited to announce that A Very Bonang Year reached a record-breaking 1.86 million viewership in its first episode of broadcast. This is unheard of for any broadcast platform in SA for a celebrity-driven reality show genre and at a time when SA viewers have more reality TV content to choose from,” Zandile Nkonyeni, Head of PR: SABC TV Channels, said in a statement.

She said the channel had avoided celebrity reality shows until now and was happy to see their decision to acquire Bonang's show pay off.

The show was also a huge hit online, trending for two days straight. According to a statement from Bonang's team, it reached more than 1.3 billion impressions on social media.

“The extraordinary amount of hashtag impressions — number 1 trending hashtag in SA over Saturday & Sunday — emphasised the 'B Effect', with even more hashtag impressions than the 1.1 billion reached during the launch of The House of BNG last year,” they claimed.

Bonang was just as excited at the news and told fans it was “madness”.

“Pow! Madness. Thank you guys so much,” she said in response to messages of congratulations.

In part two of the series, which airs this weekend, Bonang is back in the US to receive her E! Entertainment award and attends a Wild Aid gala along with Hollywood star Djimon Hounsou.

In New York, Bonang continues apartment hunting and takes to the red carpet with Trevor Noah. There will also be a snippet of her interview with Charlamagne Tha God and DJ Envy on America’s biggest radio show, The Breakfast Club.

The much-anticipated series had been in the pipeline for several months. There were talks about it being a holiday special or an exclusive on a streaming service, before SABC announced last month that it would be airing the show.

Speaking at the announcement, Bonang said 2019 was one of the biggest years in her career, and fans of the series would get a front-row seat to see why.

“I thought because 2019 was such a big year, I want everybody to be able to see what the hell I have actually been up to. I thought this is the perfect time to bring the story back home, to come home.”