Over 15m votes were cast during the 2010 series of X Factor

"The X Factor sparked a £5m phone vote bonanza after more than 15 million votes were cast during the course of the series won by Matt Cardle last night.
A total of 15,488,019 votes were cast during the seventh season of Simon Cowell's ITV1 show, which peaked with a record of nearly 20 million viewers on Sunday.
The figures, published for the first time today, revealed that Cardle won every round of voting apart from the first, when he was beaten into second place by Mary Byrne.
Viewers voted by phone or via the red button, with landline and red button votes costing 35p each, but votes from mobile phones were likely to cost substantially more.
But even at 35p, the total number of votes translates to revenue of more than £5.4m, with proceeds split between Simon Cowell's Syco production company, the programme's co-producer Fremantle Media, broadcaster ITV and the phone vote operator, Harvest Media.
The total revenue, however, is set to be much higher once mobile phone votes are taken into account. How the revenue is divided between the four parties remains a closely kept secret."
Source:  The Guardian, 13th December 2010