• by Wayne Friedman , November 7, 2024

Presidential Election Night prime-time viewing was down 25% to 42.3 million average viewers versus 2020 which had 56.9 million, according to Nielsen.

For the four-hour period from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. ET, the coverage aired on 18 TV networks. Nielsen says 28.45 million U.S. households watched the coverage.

TV networks with election coverage included ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, The CW, CNBC, CNN, CNNe, Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, MSNBC, Newsmax, NewsNation, PBS.Scripps News, Telemundo, Univision and Merit Street Media.

Fox News Channel led all networks, averaging 10.3 million viewers in prime time viewing.

Other leading networks included MSNBC, at 6.0 million, followed by ABC with 5.9 million; NBC, 5.5 million; CNN, 5.1 million; CBS, 3.6 million; Fox Television Network, 1.6 million; Newsmax, 950,000; Fox Business, 898,000; and The CW, 121,000.

Nielsen says that for its total 42.3 million viewership, the biggest audience group across all 18 networks was viewers 55 and up  -- at 24.4 million. Persons 34-54 came in at 11.4 million, while 18-34 viewers were at 4.4 million.

Audience estimates were inclusive of out-of-home viewing for all reported networks except Merit Street Media, Newsmax, NewsNation, PBS and Scripps News, which do not include out-of-home contributions.

Samba TV estimates 35.6 million U.S. households watched coverage from 4 p.m. through midnight, the average household watching two hours/13 minutes.