Over 10 million viewers watched Fox News’ telecast of the inauguration, toppling all other networks
More Americans were watching Fox News Channel to witness President Trump’s historic inauguration than any other network.
From 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. ET, Fox News averaged 10.3 million viewers with two million in the advertiser-coveted adults 25-54 demographic, according to Nielsen Media Research. FOX Business additionally garnered 282,000 total viewers while FOX News Media peaked at nearly 11 million combined viewers.
In second place in coverage of Trump’s inauguration is ABC with only 4.7 million viewers. NBC is in third place with 4.4 million viewers, followed by CBS with 4.1 million.
CNN, hot on its heels crushing loss of defamation trialit reached only 1.7 million viewers. And MSNBC, whose liberal ratings have been in freefall since Trump’s election victory in November, averaged just 848,000 total viewers.
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Donald Trump is sworn in as the 47th President of the United States by Chief Justice John Roberts as Melania Trump holds a Bible during the 60th presidential inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (Morry Gash/AP Photo, Pool)
Fox News coverage, led by anchors Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum, accounted for a whopping 80% share of cable news viewers, surpassing that of CNN and MSNBC.
Fox News maintained its dominance throughout the day and in prime time. The network averaged more than six million viewers, including one million in the key demo, from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. ET.
MSNBC trailed in second place with an average of 1.1 million total viewers and a paltry 93,000 viewers in the key demo. CNN was third with 1 million viewers, but ahead of MSNBC in key demo viewers, averaging 269,000.
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President Trump delivers his second presidential inaugural address on January 20, 2024. (Fox News)
Fox News Media saw significant growth in its digital properties compared to Trump’s first inauguration in 2017 and President Biden’s inauguration in 2021. Fox News Digital had its best day in media initiations and minutes spent since the day after the 2024 presidential election. Total Watch Time FOX News of Go increased by 83% compared to 2021, a 72% increase in media initiatives and a 35% increase in unique viewing devices.
Fox News Media was also strong in social media engagement compared to other news outlets, garnering a whopping 8.8 million interactions across Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and X, according to Emplifi.
Fox News also dominated as the largest news brand on YouTube, surpassing NBC News with a whopping 142% more video views.
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President-elect Donald Trump arrives for the 60th presidential inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025 () (Chip Somodevilla/Pool Photo via AP)
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Trump is the second president ever to serve two non-consecutive terms, the first being Grover Cleveland more than 100 years ago. Monday’s inauguration was held in the rotunda of the Capitol building due to record low temperatures, the first time since Ronald Reagan’s second inauguration 40 years ago.
Fox News’ Sean Hannity will present an interview with President Donald Trump from the Oval Office on Wednesday at 9:00 PM ET.
