SOTU Ratings: Fox News Tops in Viewers; CNN Wins Demo

NBC is most-watched broadcaster, and overall

By Andrea Morabito -- Broadcasting & Cable, 2/13/2013 3:55:39 PM

Updated: 6:39 p.m. ET

On a Tuesday evening that had the cable networks splitting coverage between the standoff with murder suspect Christopher Dorner and the State of the Union address, victory was split between Fox News Channel and CNN, according to Nielsen ratings.

For President Obama's address from 9:15-10:15 p.m. ET, Fox News was the most-watched network with 3.683 million total viewers, just ahead of CNN's 3.635 million viewers. MSNBC was in third with 3.034 million total viewers.

But in the target demo for news, adults 25-54, CNN ranked first, drawing 1.436 million viewers, beating out second-place MSNBC, who had 1.028 million viewers. FNC averaged the fewest younger viewers with 957,000.

The State of the Union ratings were in line with the rankings for breaking news coverage of Dorner from 6-9:15 p.m. Leading in Obama's speech, Fox News had the most viewers with 3.183 million and CNN was on top with adults 25-54 with 1.013 million demo viewers.

Compared to the 2012 State of the Union, CNN was up 36% in both marks, MSNBC increased 26% in the demo and 8% with total viewers and Fox declined 16% with adults 25-54 and 3% among viewers.

Meanwhile on broadcast, NBC was the most-watched network with 6.469 million total viewers and CBS was just behind with 6.4 million viewers. ABC averaged 5.494 million viewers and Fox had 2.12 million. NBC also topped the adults 25-54 demo with 2.688 million viewers, ahead of ABC's 2.054 million and CBS' 1.977 million.

CBS however topped the post-speech analysis coverage with 5.899 million total viewers to NBC's 5.754 million and ABC's 4.922 million viewers. While CBS and NBC stayed in analysis through 11 p.m., ABC went to a repeat of Modern Family at 10:46 p.m.