TV coverage of the 2008 U.S. election results drew more than 71 million average viewers Tuesday night, according to Nielsen.
Live news coverage was carried on both broadcast and cable networks, including Spanish-language networks: ABC, CBS, FOX Broadcast, NBC, Telemundo, Univision, BBC America, BET, CNBC, CNN, FOX News Channel, MSNBC, and TV One.
Nielsen’s audience estimates include primetime coverage, from 8pm to 11pm, in the Eastern and Central Time Zones and live in Mountain and Pacific Time Zones.
Audience estimates for the 8pm to 12:30am time frame, which featured Sen. McCain’s concession speech and President-Elect Obama’s speech in Chicago, are also included below.
In 2004, almost 59.2 million viewers tuned in between 8pm and 11pm to watch Election Night TV coverage, as President Bush defeated Sen. John Kerry to win re-election.
On Election Night in 2000, almost 61.6 million viewers (excluding viewers of Spanish language networks) watched primetime TV coverage of President Bush and Former Vice President Al Gore’s embattled election contest.
Nielsen’s broadcast audience numbers include a combination of national and local news coverage.
View the full media alert.
Read coverage of Nielsen’s findings by the Associated Press and Reuters, as well as in The Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, Mediaweek, and Media Life magazine.
[...] 71 Million Watch Election Coverage – Nielsen [...]
where’s KATIE?
Wow! And McCain didn’t win! Darn.
Fox News fell flat on their face with their election night coverage. They are my source of news but I thought their coverage, set, and overall presentation was weak. How many times did Megan Kelleys’ election information technology not perform? Brit Hume & his reparte with Chris Wallace was cumbersome, poorly arranged and unprofessional. Karl Roves’ insights and observations came close to saving the night. He was interesting, thought provoking and accurate. After the disappointing broasdcast, I started surfin’ the other channels, & much to my surprise, I picked CNN as doing the best job. Come on Fox, get your act together, you’re about to lose another listener.
[...] over 71 million Americans tuned in to watch the election night results, CNN viewers were treated to a new [...]
I have no reply other than I think people are in for a big disapointment.
Also, it seems like over a 100 million American’s missed the vote last night, what’s going on.
Thank God we had a movie to watch and didn’t watch one minute of that crap.
I watched on current tv. best coverage of the night because they had no talking heads. just a picture of a map dancing to music with 5 news outlets election returns and headlines as reported.
Funny, 45 million tuned in to see American Idol finale 2 season’s ago.
Does this say something about America?
With close to 100 million watching the superbowl this year, this election came in a distant second for the year.
Who cares about all these numbers. They don’t mean anything. Whatever network you watched, you watched. It only matters to the vain network bigwigs what the ratings are. Plus, these numbers aren’t reliable any way.
WHO CARES?
I was a hard core Fox viewer but I am so disappoited in their recent coverage of this election. They are trying to hard to be one of the top 3 channels and they have lost what they started out as….an alternative for conservative viewers. They had Mr. Juan Williams crying after the winner was announced. Made me sick!
Fox needs to get back to their roots.
[...] http://blog.nielsen.com/…/more-than-71-million Posted by oregniappe Filed in Links ·Tags: ABC, BBC, CNN, NBC [...]
We didn’t really have a choice it was on EVERY channel!
Hey 400Count, it does matter that ONLY 115 million people voted.
What’s the pop of the USA/ 375 million approx.
A 28% turnout…wowie zowie.
Back to American Idol.
With over a billion votes throughout the entire season.
We must keep our priorities in order.
Super Bowl, American Idol, Gossip Girl..however I would recommend Mad Men to anyone with a brain.
i would have to agree with what was said earlier that fox did a poor job with the coverage. un-professional, malfunctioning technology, brit hume miss-called ohio. it was atrocious. i’m a dedicated foxnews guy, but that was embarassing.
[...] Ratings speak volumes though, and CNN enjoyed second place of 14 major networks covering the event with 12.3 million viewers. ABC was the victor, at just over 13 million viewers. In all, it’s estimated about 71 million viewers tuned in on Tuesday to watch the results unfold. As impressive at it sounds, it’s still over 25 million shy of this year’s past Super Bowl. Apparently the world’s couch potatoes are still more interested in the Patriots than in patriotism. (Nielsen’s complete ratings here.) [...]
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