DNC night one ratings rally to beat RNC’s as Biden gives outgoing speech

Despite the Democratic National Convention failing to top its 2016 viewership, its first night drew higher ratings than those of the first three nights of last month’s Republican National Convention.

Roughly 20 million viewers tuned in to watch the DNC’s first night, according to Nielsen data. While the viewership reportedly topped that of the 2020 DNC, which was held virtually, it fell 22% below 2016’s ratings. 

Around 19.1 million viewers watched live between 11:30 p.m. and 12:30 a.m. Eastern as President Joe Biden gave his final DNC speech as the party’s leader. While the timing of the president’s speech drew criticism, Harris-Walz campaign communications director Michael Tyler dismissed it as being due to so much applause throughout the evening.

“I think what you saw last night, there’s no doubt that we got a little bit behind schedule, but the fact of the matter is that you had speaker after speaker after speaker that was interrupted with applause after applause after applause,” Tyler said on Fox News’s America’s Newsroom. “And it’s because you have a Democratic Party that is, No. 1, as you saw last night, united in its gratitude to President Biden, united in its support for Kamala Harris, and united in their enthusiasm that they have for this election because they fundamentally understand the stakes.”

The first night’s ratings account for viewers tuning in on ABC, CBS, NBC, Scripps News, Univision, CNN, CNNe, Fox Business, Fox News, MSNBC, Newsmax, NewsNation, and PBS.

The first three nights of last month’s RNC drew 18.1 million, 14.8 million, and 18 million viewers respectively.  

On the last night of the RNC that featured former President Donald Trump’s speech, viewership peaked with nearly 10 million more than Biden’s Monday night speech at 28.4 million viewers.