CNN Draws Lowest-Rated Primetime Quarter On Record
CNN averaged just 124,000 primetime viewers in the advertiser-coveted 25-54 age demographic for the first quarter of 2023.
According to Mediaite, that's the lowest mark since data tracking began in 1991.
Never before has CNN drawn a primetime average so low. In the category, the network shed 73 percent of viewers from the same time last year.
CEO Chris Licht hopes to right the ship with Charles Barkley and Gayle King, both of whom are nearing deals to host a weekly primetime show.
But as we argued, Barkley and King once a week is hardly a sufficient solution.
Plus, said problems have trickled down throughout the network. CNN is down 64 percent year-over-year in the total day demo, and 52 percent overall.
The viewer exodus in 2022 was no anomaly. It is CNN's new reality.
CNN ratings.
The network's most glaring concern begins in the early hours. Last fall, CNN demoted Don Lemon to the morning. And morning viewers have responded by changing the channel.
CNN This Morning ranked 40th in cable news last quarter. The program was non-competitive with MSNBC’s Morning Joe and Fox & Friends, which averaged 846,000 and 1.21 million respectively. (Disclosure: Fox News and OutKick share ownership.)
The best we say about CNN This Morning is that Don Lemon's catfight with his female co-hosts generated great internet fodder.
If CNN were a woman, one might argue it's past its prime.
The highest-rated show on the network, Anderson Cooper 360, ranked 26th. The highest-rated show in the demo, Erin Burnett OutFront, ranks 21st.
Desperation has crept in. There's no other way to classify a news network turning to a basketball player and a friend of Oprah. Or publishing an article warning white people they might be offenders of "digital blackface."
At this rate, CNN is more likely to compete with NewsNation, an upstart cable news network, than with Fox News and MSNBC.
The Biden years:
Rampant inflation, surging crime, chaos at the border, a mockery of the White House, and destruction of CNN.