13.51 Million Watch GOP Debate on CBS

By Chris Ariens 

The 9th GOP debate among the final 6 candidates was watched by 13.5 million viewers on CBS last night.

That’s the fifth most-watched GOP debate this cycle and highest since CNN’s GOP debate on Dec. 15. The 2-hour debate peaked between 10:00-10:30 p.m. ET, with 14.63 million viewers. There are two more GOP debates scheduled, one before Super Tuesday on CNN, and one two days after Super Tuesday, on Fox News.

The final debate of the 2012 cycle occurred on Feb. 22, 2012, with four candidates: Ron Paul, Rick Santorum, Mitt Romney, and Newt Gingrich. There were 20 GOP debates last time around.

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Here’s the 2016 debate ranker, which includes Nielsen viewership data, along with livestreaming information provided by the networks.

Debate Network Total Viewers A25-54 Streams
Aug. 6 | GOP Fox News 24,000,000 7,900,000 2,400000**
Sept. 16 | GOP CNN 22,940,000 6,900,000 4,500,000
Oct. 13 | Dem CNN 15,791,000 4,998,000 4,300,000
Oct. 28 | GOP CNBC 14,000,000 3,900,000 ***
Nov. 10 | GOP FBN 13,500,000 3,670,000 2,800,000
Nov. 14 | Dem CBS 8,500,000 2,120,000 1,200,000
Dec. 15 | GOP CNN 18,165,000 5,560,000 3,100,000
Dec. 19 | Dem ABC 7,850,000 1,928,000 ***
Jan. 14 | GOP FBN 11,094,000 2,983,000 1,900,000
Jan. 17 | Dem NBC 10,200,000 3,170,000 1,200,000
Jan. 28 | GOP Fox News 12,466,000 3,467,000 1,350,000
Feb. 4 | Dem MSNBC 4,489,000 1,211,000 ***
Feb. 6 | GOP ABC 13,181,000 3,384,000 1,300,000
Feb. 11 | Dem PBS (with CNN simulcast) 8,030,000 2,300,000 TBD
Feb. 13 | GOP CBS 13,510,000 3,520,000 TBD
Feb. 25 | GOP CNN TBD TBD TBD
Mar. 3 | GOP Fox News TBD TBD TBD
Mar. 6 | Dem CNN TBD TBD TBD
Mar. 9 | Dem Univision TBD TBD TBD

**Users needed to be an authenticated viewer to watch the livestream.
***Livestream data has not been revealed.

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