American Idol (season 7) American Idol (season 7) The seventh season of "American Idol", the annual reality show and singing competition, began on January 15, 2008 and concluded on May 21, 2008. Ryan Seacrest continued to host the show with Simon Cowell, Paula Abdul, and Randy Jackson returning as judges. David Cook was announced the winner of the competition on May 21, 2008, defeating runner-up David Archuleta by a margin of roughly 12 million votes out of over 97 million, which was at that time the highest recorded vote total ever recorded in the show's history. The split was 56% to 44%. The seventh
American Idol such as DialIdol, and Vote for the Worst. The enormous success of the show and the revenue it generated was transformative for the 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). The show pushed Fox to become the number one U.S.