EastEnders was one of BBC iPlayer’s most watched shows in July, claiming 16 of the top 20 most popular programmes of the month.

The soap opera’s highest charting episode originally aired on July 7, and was requested 1.2 million times by viewers on the catch-up service.

Seven episodes of EastEnders landed in the top 10 most requested shows, totalling around 7.8 million streams overall.

EastEnders
Steve McFadden as Phil Mitchell and Lucy Benjamin as Lisa Fowler in EastEnders (Duncan Ireland/BBC/PA)

Fans of EastEnders were kept entertained with several storylines, including Louise Mitchell (Tilly Keeper) being attacked at her school prom and the return of her mother Louise Fowler (Lucy Benjamin) after years away.

The month’s most popular broadcast was the first episode of crime drama In The Dark, which – after being made available from July 11 – received 1.6 million requests.

The second episode of the four-part mini-series, starring Ripper Street’s MyAnna Buring, came in eighth place overall with 1.1 million streams.

An episode of Doctor Who was the only other show to land in the top 10 for the month.

In The Dark
MyAnna Buring in In The Dark (Todd Anthony/BBC)

The final episode of the most recent series, which saw outgoing Time Lord Peter Capaldi begin to regenerate, was viewed just under 1.2 million times on iPlayer following its broadcast on July 1.

BBC Three’s Stacey Dooley Investigates Kids Selling Drugs Online was requested 719,000 times and The Betrayed Girls, a BBC One documentary about the Rochdale abuse case, was streamed 675,000 times.

Other popular shows included crime drama Top Of The Lake, starring Elisabeth Moss and Nicole Kidman, and period drama Poldark.

The BBC said that iPlayer received 236 million requests for its TV content across the month of July.

Peter Capaldi
Peter Capaldi (Ian West/PA)

Dan McGolpin, Controller of Programming and Daytime, said: “Watching BBC iPlayer through the TV is now easy to do and for many people it’s become their preferred way to view BBC programmes, both on demand and live.

“We release a wide selection of fresh content every month of the year and July saw strong performances from a mix of gripping drama series and challenging investigative documentaries.”