NBC’s Republican Debate Draws 6.8 Million Viewers—And Rare Kudos From Conservative Media

The Republican presidential primary debate Wednesday night drew 6.863 million viewers on NBC, and 1.312 million viewers in the key demographic of adults 25-54, which represents a significant drop off from the first GOP debate of the 2024 cycle, which drew 12.8 million viewers on Fox News back in August.

NBC’s streaming coverage of the debate on NBC News Now delivered its largest prime time audience ever, with viewership on the platform up 442% across all four hours, including the live debate, lead-up coverage and post-debate analysis. NBC says the combined audience—including linear television, digital and streaming—reached a total audience of 7.51 million viewers.

The debate lifted MSNBC into first place at 10 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET, delivering a total audience of 2.286 million viewers at 10 (compared to Fox News Channel’s 1.921 million and CNN’s 995,000) and 1.528 million viewers at 11 (Fox News delivered 1.077 million viewers and CNN had 663,000). MSNBC’s post-debate analysis was anchored by Rachel Maddow, alongside Nicolle Wallace, Ari Melber, Joy Reid, Chris Hayes, Lawrence O’Donnell and Stephanie Ruhle.

But perhaps most surprising was the reaction to the debate from conservative media, which is often harshly critical of NBC, MSNBC and CNN. “NBC is actually asking the GOP candidates some really good questions tonight,” said Evan Kilgore of Turning Point USA in a post on X. This is the best Presidential debate so far.”

Several commentators drew comparisons between NBC’s debate and the first GOP primary debate in the 2024 cycle, moderated by Fox News Channel’s Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum. The Daily Wire’s Gregg Re said it was “absolutely humiliating that NBC ran such a better debate than Fox. There was no survivor ‘who would you vote off the island’ question. No constant shouting. Conservative media causes many problems.”

“That was the best debate this cycle. NBC did a much better job that the awful Fox News debate,” said Josh Power, host of the conservative podcast The Simple Truth. “They controlled the room, kept it civil and on point, did a pretty good job.”

“NBC News actually did well here. The questions weren’t biased. They waited too long for domestic questions, but other than that, it was a well-run debate. Way better than the Fox news debates.” the writer Bonchie of RedState said in a post on X.

Conservative commentators and more mainstream reviewers also credited NBC’s Kristen Welker and Lester Holt, noting that they avoided gimmicky questions while holding the candidates to the rules of the debate, especially Vivek Ramaswamy, who repeatedly attempted to talk past time limits and to try and interject himself into other candidate’s responses.

“Kristen Welker is owning Ramaswamy with his ridiculous attempts to dominate the debate stage with his ridiculous commentary,” said Bradley Cortright of Independent Journal Review, while the Fort-Worth Star Telegram’s Nicole Russell said “this debate is much more orderly than the previous two. Kudos to the moderators and NBC.”

“The NBC News moderators — Lester Holt, Kristen Welker — kept proceedings under control,” said Vox’s Andrew Prokop, “and asked mostly decent, issues-based questions.”

“At first, I wondered whether it was wise for Lester Holt to dominate the early questioning. But he’s kept a lid on the debate in the early going, admirably,” said NPR’s Eric Deggans.