As 2017 draws to a close, Fox Business Network (FBN) is going to beat competitor CNBC for the first time ever in Business Day viewers.
FBN, which launched in 2007, will set internal records this year across both Business Day (9:30 a.m. – 5 p.m.) and Total Day (6 a.m. – 6 a.m.) averages, in terms of overall viewers and in the key adults 25-54 demographic. The older CNBC — which has successfully overhauled primetime in recent years — delivered record lows in both of those previously mentioned time periods.
In Business Day viewership, FBN was up 27 percent in total viewers (with 195,000 overall audience members) and up 14 percent in the key demo (25,000) compared to 2016. Meanwhile, CNBC is down double digits. To be fair to the latter network, however, CNBC does still draw more viewers than Fox in the main demo across Business Day. It also dominates Primetime and wins Total Day outright, and even outdraws FBN in the Post Market (5 p.m. – 8 p.m.) demo.
Here are some comparisons between the two networks across a variety of business-centric time periods:
Nielsen Business News Ratings
Business Day (9:30AM-5PM/ET)
FBN: 195,000 total viewers/25,000 adults 25-54
CNBC: 166,000/30,000
Total Day (6AM-6AM/ET)
FBN: 144,000 total viewers/20,000 adults 25-54
CNBC: 156,000/50,000
Post Market (5-8PM/ET)
FBN: 217,000 total viewers/28,000 adults 25-54
CNBC: 143,000/43,000