Trump Vs. Harris Presidential Debate Viewership Tops Trump, Biden Total But Falls Short Of Records: Here's How Many People Watched

Tuesday's presidential debate between Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris saw increased viewership from the 2024 debate between Trump and President Joe Biden, with viewers tuning in for the first in-person meeting of the two candidates.

What Happened: The presidential debate between Trump and Harris was watched by 67.1 million people Tuesday, topping the 51.3 million total from the June debate between Trump and Biden.

ABC, a unit of Walt Disney Co DIS, hosted the debate and saw 19.05 million viewers, as reported by Deadline.

The presidential debate was simulcast by more than a dozen media companies. Here's a look at how other media networks fared:

• NBC News: 10.1 million viewers
• Fox News: 9.1 million viewers
• MSNBC: 6.4 million viewers
• CBS News: 6.2 million viewers
• Fox Broadcasting: 4.9 million viewers
• CNN: 4.4 million viewers

Fox Corp FOXFOXA trailed the leaders in a potential surprise as the media company topped the last debate viewership over host CNN thanks to a strong political viewership fan base for Fox News.

A total of 21.3 million people in the 25-54 age demographic watched the debate. ABC won this demographic with 6.6 million viewers followed by NBC News at 3.7 million and Fox News at 1.9 million.

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Why It's Important: For Disney, the strong viewership figure could help the company in the current quarter for market share in the media space and the company also likely benefitted from strong advertiser demand during the event. Tuesday’s debate was 90 minutes in length and featured two commercial breaks.

The viewership figure for Tuesday's debate topped the earlier 2024 debate, but fell short of past presidential debates from other election years.

The first presidential debate between Biden in Trump in the 2020 election was watched by 73.1 million people. The first presidential debate between Trump and Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election was watched by 84 million people, setting a new record.

Tuesday's debate is currently the only presidential debate scheduled between Trump and Harris and could be the last with less than two months until the election. Other media companies have reached out in attempts for debates. Several polls point to Trump losing the debate and his recent commentary seems more reluctant to debate again.

A vice-presidential debate between J.D. Vance and Tim Walz, hosted by CBS News, is currently scheduled for Oct. 1.

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Photo: Courtesy ABC News