The Fox News Channel scored the highest ratings of any broadcast or cable network for its multi-night coverage of the 2024 Republican National Convention (RNC) in Milwaukee, according to data from Nielsen.
More than 10.3 million people tuned in to watch former President Donald Trump accept the Republican nomination, marking the highest program of the year and outpacing CNN’s presidential debate in June, the network said in a press release. Of those that watched, 2.1 million were in the key demographic of adults ages 25 to 54 years old (A25-54), the group most-attractive to cable news advertisers. The figures included the Fox News broadcast and a simulcast on Fox Business Network.
Across all four nights of the RNC, Fox News averaged 6.7 million overall viewers and 1.1 million in the A25-54 group during prime-time. By comparison, CNN had 1.2 million overall viewers in prime-time during the RNC, while MSNBC had 1.1 million viewers in prime-time. In the A25-54 demographic, CNN had around 349,000 viewers and MSNBC grabbed 143,000 viewers in prime-time, Nielsen data showed.
Fox News programming was simulcast on the Fox Business Network during key parts of the convention, with ancillary programmed produced by Fox News available for Fox broadcast stations and affiliates across the country. Nielsen data for the broadcast network was not immediately available, and the ratings for the two cable news channels did not include viewership on the Fox broadcast network.
On the final night of the convention, Fox’s late-night comedy panel show “Gutfeld!’ drew 3.1 million overall viewers and 623,000 in the A25-54 demo, marking its highest-rated episode since it debuted several years ago.
Fox News and Fox Business Network are operated by Fox News Media, a subsidiary of Fox Corporation. CNN is owned by Warner Bros Discovery; MSNBC is a division of NBC News, which is part of NBC Universal, owned by Comcast.
