Fox News and CNN lost viewers year-over-year in May, especially in prime time, while MSNBC has gained in the market, yet Fox has managed to remain the most-watched network in all of cable news.
According to Mediaite, in the first full month since firing Tucker Carlson, Fox News had a 37 percent drop year over year in prime time garnering 1.42 million viewers. CNN suffered a 25 percent year-over-year decrease as their total prime time viewership sank to 494,000 viewers.
Meanwhile, MSNBC managed a 14 percent increase compared to last year, averaging 1.16 million prime time viewers.
In prime time, Fox suffered a 25 percent year-over-year decrease, averaging 135,000 demo viewers between 8 and 11 pm for the month.
MSNBC managed to come in second behind Fox with a 14 percent increase, averaging 120,000 demo viewers, easily besting CNN’s 113,000 demo viewers, a 25 percent decrease since last May.
The left-leaning outlet also managed to pick up CNN’s losses and score its largest total day viewer advantage over CNN in its 27 years on the air and was the closest it has been to Fox News in the ratings in two years, according to Mediaite.
Additionally, MSBNC was the only top 20 cable network to post double-digit year-over-year gains.
Despite its town hall with former President Donald Trump earlier this month, CNN faced historically low ratings.
CNN had its lowest-rated week in the middle of May since the second week of August 2015, and managed to drop to its third-lowest prime time demo and its second-lowest weekend demo since 1997.
The flailing network’s highest-rated show, “Anderson Cooper 360” was only the 27th highest-rated program on cable news.
Despite the decline, Fox News still blew out the competition, and for the 27th straight month, beat both CNN and MSNBC in total day and prime-time viewers.
Fox’s “The Five” remained the highest-rated show on cable news. Host Jesse Watters came in second for most watched cable host, with longtime Fox personality Sean Hannity landing in third.
Fox News also had the 7 top-rated programs, with MSNBC’s Lawrence O'Donnell and Nicole Wallace landing at positions eight and nine respectively.
