5.5 million viewers watched on CNN as the Democratic candidates for president battled in the seventh debate last night. While going down as the second least-watched overall, the 2-hour debate gave a boost to lead-out program, Race for the White House. The new 6-part docuseries narrated by Kevin Spacey averaged 2.564 million total viewers, making it the most-watched CNN Original Series premiere—and telecast—ever.
The debate, moderated by Anderson Cooper, drew 1.788 million in the A25-54 demo.
The most-watched debate of the 2008 cycle was the final debate, on April 16, 2008, when Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were still fighting for the nomination. 10.6 million people watched that debate on ABC, which was the 16th that cycle. Clinton remained in the race until early June.
Univision has the next Democratic debate Wednesday night, which will be simulcast on Fusion and CNN.
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 | 2,400,000** |
| 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/Telemundo | 14,521,000 | 4,684,000 | 2,100,000 |
| Mar. 3 | GOP | Fox News | 16,852,000 | 5,462,000 | 1,490,000 |
| Mar. 6 | Dem | CNN | 5,500,000 | 1,788,000 | 1,200,000 |
| Mar. 9 | Dem | Univision | TBD | TBD | TBD |
| Mar. 10 | GOP | CNN | TBD | TBD | TBD |
**Users needed to be an authenticated viewer to watch the livestream.
***Livestream data has not been revealed.