Fox and CNN Win the Early Ratings Battle for Wartime Cable News Viewership, While MSNBC Falls Off | Charts
Amid the mounting tragedy in the Middle East, Fox News and CNN are the early winners in the cable network ratings battle, flexing their on-the-ground foreign reporting muscles, while MSNBC suffered a fall-off at the beginning of the conflict from which it has yet to recover.
In the immediate aftermath of the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas terrorists in Israel, in which they massacred over 1,400 Israeli citizens, all three cable news channels saw viewership boosts of varying degrees, but Fox and CNN saw the main benefit.
From Oct. 9 to Oct. 15, Fox News scored 1.57 million average total viewers, a 22% increase from the week of Oct. 7. MSNBC secured second place with 766,000 viewers, a 20% decrease for the network from the week prior. CNN came in third, drawing 681,000 viewers, a 13% improvement for the network, according to Nielsen.
Fox News and CNN held on to elevated viewership at the end of October, with both networks ending higher in total average viewers than before the war broke out. MSNBC, however, was the only major cable news network to start the month better than it finished in total average viewership.
During the second week of war coverage, CNN and Fox News both saw their ratings level out a bit, while MSNBC caught back up after initial viewership declines. Week three of war coverage saw little change in viewership numbers for the networks.
“CNN and Fox had key reporters in place covering the story at the outset and both benefited from that,” David Clinch, a media growth consultant for Media Growth Partners, told TheWrap. Fox News foreign correspondent Trey Yingst, in particular, “has had on the ground coverage from the start,” Clinch said.
For CNN, experiencing a ratings boon during a major international conflict is nothing new. The network has shined in the past when war has broken out, including during Operation Desert Storm in 1991, after the Sept. 11, 2001, counter-attacks on Afghanistan, and during the wars in Iraq and Ukraine. The network’s strength has always been in foreign coverage and the Gaza conflict has been an opportunity for CNN to flex their well-sourced muscles.
“CNN always gets some of the old ‘switch on CNN’ boost when big stories like this break and they were able to get more reporters on the ground relatively quickly, despite some travel and logistics issues that all networks faced,” Clinch said.
Cable News and Conflict
The Middle East conflict, whose death toll in Gaza has climbed to nearly 9,000 people, the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry said Thursday, has come at a time when CNN has struggled with viewership. That has been partially attributable to poor programming decisions made by former CEO Chris Licht, but also due to the decline in linear television.
Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, primetime viewership for all three major cable news networks climbed 49.9% from the previous week. In the first week of the Ukraine war, CNN averaged 1.496 million primetime viewers, 161% more than its 573,000 average the previous week.
Cable networks also benefited from the removal of Republican Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House on Oct. 3. However, most of the higher numbers seen from that unprecedented event was squashed by the House adjourning for a week immediately after, and the outbreak of war in the Middle East, the shocking atrocities of which quickly dominated the news cycle.
Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), lambasted MSNBC while on air in an Oct. 9 interview with “Morning Joe” over its coverage of the Hamas attack on Israel. Greenblatt tore into MSNBC for the use of the word “fighter” and “militant” to describe Hamas terrorists who massacred innocent civilians.
“Please stop calling this a retaliation,” he said. “This is a defensive measure against an organization that is committed to one thing, killing Jews.”
A few days later, on Oct. 13, a Semafor report claimed that MSNBC had quietly sidelined three Muslim anchors — Mehdi Hasan, Ayman Mohyeldin, and Ali Velshi — in its initial coverage of the Israel-Hamas war, potentially affecting the network’s credibility in covering the war. The network denied that the anchors were “benched” or “silenced” saying there was no truth to that reporting.
“MSNBC had some switches in reporters on the ground early on and then some confusion about the on-air role that Ayman Mohyeldin and Mehdi Hasan were playing so that may have impacted their viewing figures,” Clinch told TheWrap.
The Numbers
In the demo from Oct. 9 to Oct 15, Fox News maintained first place with 217,000 viewers in the adults 25-54 age range, a whopping 42% increase from the week of Oct. 7. CNN nabbed 149,000 viewers in the demo, a significant 27% from the week prior. MSNBC fell to third with 93,000 viewers ages 25-54, an 11% decrease compared to the prior prior week.
Breaking down the first full week of the war further, in primetime programming (8 pm.-11 p.m.) for the first full week of the war, Fox News drew 2.25 million average total viewers, up 10% from the week of Oct. 7. MSNBC nabbed second with 1.10 million viewers, but the network saw a 26% decline from the prior week. CNN scored 810,000 average total viewers, a 4% improvement.
In the key 25-54 demographic for primetime during the week of Oct. 9 to Oct. 15, Fox News nabbed 286,000 viewers in the 25-54 age range, a 24% increase from the week before. CNN beat out MSNBC with 196,000 viewers, up 26% from the week of Oct. 7. MSNBC finished with 122,000 viewers in the 25-54 age range, a 20% decrease from the prior week.
According to Clinch, Fox News benefits from a massive primetime audience that “relies on their opinion anchors to comment on, and in many ways interpret, any and all international stories through the prism of partisan politics in the U.S. So, they had good editorial coverage and they got good prime time opinion-driven audiences as well.”
After the initial shock from Oct. 7 had worn off, the first week of the war saw a peak in viewership for Fox News and CNN, in correlation to the outbreak of war. MSNBC, on the other hand, saw its lowest viewership in the three-week period assessed by TheWrap. While the network remained competitive with CNN in terms of total viewership numbers, it is clear that some gravitated elsewhere, away from MSNBC which tends to thrive in a more charged domestic political environment.
The second full week of the war saw cable news viewership level out a bit, with CNN and Fox News both seeing viewership decreases and MSNBC recouping some losses from the prior week.
From Oct. 16 to Oct. 22, Monday-Sunday full day, Fox News scored 1.35 million average total viewers, a 14% decline from the first full week of war in the Middle East. MSNBC came in second with 906,000 viewers, an 18% improvement from the week prior. CNN came in third with 624,000 viewers, an 8% decrease.
Breaking down the second week of war further, primetime saw a similar trend, with Fox News leading the pack but with slight viewership decreases, likely correlated to war coverage fatigue. From Oct. 16 to Oct. 22, Fox News scored 2.05 million average total viewers in the 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. programming period, a 9% decline from the week prior. MSNBC nabbed 1.29 viewers in primetime, a 17% increase and CNN secured 687,000 viewers, a 15% decline.
In the primetime demo, Fox News drew 251,000 viewers in the 25-54 age range, a 12% decline from the first full week of the war. CNN came in second with 182,000 viewers in the demo, a 7% decline, and MSNBC came in third with 124,000 viewers, a 2% improvement.
The third week of the war, Oct. 23 to Oct. 29, saw a similar trend to that of the week before: a leveling out of the viewership. Still, Fox News and CNN both ended out the month of October with larger audiences than before the war broke out, while MSNBC was still recouping losses from the first full week of the conflict as it continues to press on in November.
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