The final TV ratings are in for the second night of the Democratic National Convention, and once again the DNC attracted a larger audience than its Republican counterparts did last week.
From 10-11:15 p.m. — a timeframe that included headline speaker Bill Clinton’s nearly 50-minute speech extolling the virtues of official Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton — NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, and Fox Business Network drew an average audience of 24.7 million.
That number is slightly below the total for Night 2 of 2012’s DNC, which drew 25.12 million across those networks, minus Fox Business, but plus PBS and Current TV. It is, however, nearly 5 million more pairs of eyeballs than Night 2 of the 2016 RNC drew last Tuesday (19.75 million).
CNN, which garnered the biggest convention audience of the night, was once again up sharply from 2012’s draw, with 5.93 million total viewers from 10-11:15, and 2.05 million in the important-to-cable-news demographic of 25-54. In 2012, CNN drew 4.13 million total viewers from 10-11 p.m. and 1.54 million in the 25-54 demo.
MSNBC slipped behind second-place NBC with 3.83 million viewers and 1.17 million in the 25-54 demo, but remained ahead of ABC, CBS, and Fox News.
Fox News slipped to a not-unexpected last place in terms of DNC coverage, with 2.85 million total viewers and 634,000 in the 25-54 demo.
Again, it’s worth recalling that in 2012, the DNC occurred over only three days. On the second night, Sept. 5, 2012, NBC carried the NFL season opener (New York Giants vs. Dallas Cowboys) rather than any convention coverage.
