CNN Democratic Debate, Night 1: Viewership Insights

Last night CNN hosted the first of a two-part Democratic debate event in Detroit, with each evening featuring 10 candidates. Taking the stage for night 1: Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg, Beto O’Rourke, Marianne Williamson, Amy Klobuchar, John Hickenlooper, Tim Ryan, John Delaney, and Steve Bullock.

Below, we share minute-by-minute viewership of the debates as well as where people were tuning in from, courtesy of Inscape, the TV data company with glass-level insights from a panel of more than 11 million smart TVs. Also below: a look at the audience for three of last night’s frontrunners.

Viewership peaked around 8:45pm ET, as the candidates sparred over health care and Medicare for All.

Hot spots of viewer location during the evening included the DMAs of Washington, DC; Detroit, MI; Helena, MT; Glendive, MT; Palm Springs, CA; Topeka, KS; West Palm Beach-Ft. Pierce, FL; and Tampa-St. Petersburg, FL, among others.

We also looked into the social media audience demographics for three of last night’s frontrunners: Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg, using insights from CreatorIQ, an influencer platform that helps companies run brand ambassador campaigns with content creators.

A few key insights:

Sanders is the only one with a female-dominated audience (58%), and he is also popular with a younger crowd, with 50% of his audience between 18-24 years old.
Warren captures an older crowd, with 36% over the age of 54.
Buttigieg has the most male-dominated audience (57%). He also has a fairly even breakdown across age groups.

Bernie Sanders