Beyoncé’s halftime performance highlights the Christmas Day entertainment

Beyoncé brought more excitement to Netflix’s NFL debut on Christmas Day than either game.

The 32-time Grammy winner rode a white horse to her halftime performance and wowed her hometown Houston crowd with a nearly 13-minute performance on Wednesday.

Video above: Beyoncé and Blue Ivy at the premiere of Mufasa: The Lion King

She surprised fans by bringing Shaboozey to perform “Sweet Honey Buckiin” and Post Malone joined her on “Levii’s Jeans.”

The action on the field was not what was expected as the NFL featured four of the AFC’s top five teams.

Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce exposed a flaw in Pittsburgh’s defense during Kansas City’s 29-10 loss in Game 1.

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The broadcast itself went extremely well and quickly became the second most popular live title on Netflix to date, according to NFL Media.

Lamar Jackson and the Ravens led CJ Stroud and the Texans 17-2 at halftime before Beyoncé stole the show.

Mariah Carey opened Wednesday’s doubleheader with a taped performance of “All I Want for Christmas is You,” and then the two-time defending Super Bowl champion Chiefs defeated the Steelers to clinch the AFC’s No. 1 seed.

There were no signs of major streaming issues during the game after Netflix made minor errors early in the pregame show. The broadcast began with about 10 seconds of silence as it appeared studio host Kay Adams’ microphone was not turned on.

Beyoncé’s live performance at NRG Stadium was supposed to be the biggest test for the streaming giant and seemed to go off without a hitch.

Mahomes threw for 320 yards and three touchdowns and Kelce had eight catches for 84 yards and a score, helping the Chiefs (15-1) earn a first-round bye and home-field advantage in the AFC playoffs.

The Steelers (10-6) have lost three straight games and may have to settle for a wild-card berth instead of an AFC North title.

Netflix agreed to a three-year deal to broadcast Christmas games in May. The NFL is expected to give the streaming service one of its biggest days since the site launched in 1998.

Netflix’s 282.3 million subscribers in more than 190 countries were able to stream the games, marking the first time a broadcaster had distributed an NFL game worldwide. Netflix offered the games in five languages ​​– English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and German.

Netflix had problems streaming the fight between Mike Tyson and Jake Paul on November 14th. The fight peaked at 65 million concurrent streams, including 38 million concurrent streams in the United States. According to the website Down Detector, nearly 85,000 viewers reported issues with outages or streaming leading up to and during the fight.

There were fewer complaints on Wednesday.

According to NFL Media, viewers in all 50 states tuned in within minutes of the pregame show going live, and viewers from nearly 200 countries watched the first game.

Before the Ravens-Texans kicked off, Netflix reported that the series had surpassed the highest number of concurrent viewers on Christmas in the last four years.

The NFL played its first games on a Wednesday since the Steelers and Ravens were forced to play on December 2, 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The only time the league played on a Wednesday since 1948 was in 2012, when the Giants and Cowboys met in the season opener.

AP Sports Writer Joe Reedy contributed to this report.