According to data from Nielsen, the 47th president’s second inauguration had only 24.6 million television viewers, a far cry from former President Biden’s 2021 inauguration, which saw 33.8 million viewers, and even Trump’s 30.6 million viewers for his 2017 inauguration.
While there are multiple reasons for the low television turnout, AP noted that the long length of the coverage, which usually lasted from 10:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m., is a clear culprit. While the inauguration’s viewership peaked at 12:15 p.m. during the swearing-in ceremony, it slowly tapered off as it continued into the afternoon and evening.
The highest concentration of TV viewers congregated on Republican-lined networks like Fox News, which reported roughly 10.3 million viewers till around 1 PM. Left-lined networks like ABC, NBC, CNN, and others saw the lowest turnout, ranging from 4.7 million to 848,000 thousand.
In a press release following the inauguration, Fox News announced that their coverage of Trump’s second inauguration was the second highest in their network’s history. Additionally, the network noted record high interactions on their various social media platforms, around 8.8 million across Facebook, X/Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok. ABC had the second-highest TV viewership behind Fox News.
While the 2025 Inauguration isn’t the lowest watched in TV history, it is the lowest one since former President Barack Obama’s second inauguration in 2013. The highest inauguration viewership was Ronald Reagan’s 1981 inauguration, and the lowest was George W. Bush’s 2005 Inauguration.
The Nielsen Company said Tuesday that viewership was down from Joe Biden’s 2021 inauguration, which reached 33.8 million, and Trump’s first move into the White House, seen by 30.6 million in 2017.
