The first presidential debate between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump drew an estimated 48 million viewers, making it the highest-rated program in CNN history.
About 47.9 million people tuned in to watch Thursday night’s debate, according to early Nielsen data, in which Biden, 81, put in a dismal performance that highlighted his advanced age and frailty and raised questions about whether he could withstand the stresses of another term in the presidency.
Despite the high ratings, the audience for the event, which aired on CNN and was simulcast on 22 networks, was 34% lower than the number who watched the first presidential debate between Biden and Trump, moderated by Chris Wallace on Fox News four years ago. According to Variety.
The October 2020 debate drew a total of 73.1 million viewers. The second matchup between Trump and Biden a few weeks later was watched by 63 million people nationwide, according to Nielsen data.
The most-watched presidential debate in history took place four years earlier, in 2016, between Trump, who was then the Republican front-runner, and Hillary Clinton, who was considered the front-runner.
The first debate between Clinton and Trump was watched by a record 84 million viewers, but viewership for the subsequent debates between the two candidates dropped off to 66.5 million for the second debate and 71.6 million for the third.
An estimated 9 million people tuned in to CNN’s main channel, CNN Español and HLN for Thursday night’s debate, according to Nielsen data.
Fox News, which simulcast the debate, drew an estimated 8.8 million viewers, while ABC News had 8.7 million.
CNN rival MSNBC, a left-leaning network owned by Comcast, had 3.968 million viewers, according to Nielsen.
The low viewership for Thursday’s event may have been due in part to a variety of streaming options.
CNN’s digital properties and YouTube generated a combined 30 million views, according to the Warner Bros. Discover-owned network.
A CNN spokesman told The Washington Post that the debate was the most-watched non-sports program so far this year, both among overall viewers and among the advertiser-coveted 25-54 age group.
The debate, held at CNN studios in Atlanta, was moderated by network hosts Jake Tapper and Dana Bash.
