Continuing the trend of increasingly high audience and engagement levels throughout the busy news cycle of 2020, in October 2020 CNN reached more unique users than any other digital news platform during the month and was the highest October in CNN history.
According to Comscore, 149 million U.S. unique visitors came to CNN’s digital properties in October 2020. Globally, September 2020 registered 192 million unique visitors to CNN Digital properties – an increase of more than 23.5 million unique visitors from one year ago, according to Comscore (September 2020 data is the most current available for global traffic). CNN Digital has seen an average monthly global audience of nearly 218 million unique visitors every month of 2020 to date.
CNN retained its position as the #1 digital news destination, a ranking it’s held for more than 4 consecutive years for U.S. unique visitors, and for more than one year for global unique visitors, by holding the #1 position in October 2020 in the key categories of global news, U.S. unique visitors, mobile unique visitors, video unique viewers, and millennial unique visitors (September 2020 data is the most current available for both global traffic and video viewer rankings).
#1 IN GLOBAL DIGITAL NEWS IN SEPTEMBER 2020
CNN reached more global unique visitors than any other news platform in the world in September 2020, with 192 million unique multiplatform visitors – more than 7.5 million unique visitors than the nearest competitor, the BBC (September 2020 data is the most current available).
1. CNN.com – 192 Million Multiplatform Unique Visitors in September 2020
2. BBC – 185 million unique visitors
3. Yahoo News – 157 million unique visitors
4. DailyMail.co.uk – 134 million unique visitors
5. The New York Times Brand – 123 million unique visitors
Source: Comscore MMX® Multi-Platform, Custom-Defined List, Total Digital Audience, September 2020, Worldwide Rollup. Based on CNN.com entity compared to a custom list of single brand, English-language, global competitors in the News/Information Category, including The United States, Canada, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Norway, Singapore, Spain, Taiwan, United Kingdom and Vietnam. CNN Brand entity used prior to October 2018. (September 2020 data is the most current available).
#1 IN U.S. MULTIPLATFORM VISITORS IN OCTOBER 2020
CNN saw 149 million unique multiplatform visitors domestically in October, the best performing October in history.
1. CNN.com – 149 Million Multiplatform Unique Visitors in October 2020
2. FoxNews.com – 101 million unique visitors
3. The New York Times Brand – 99 million unique visitors
4. WashingtonPost.com – 97 million unique visitors
5. NBCNews.com – 87 million unique visitors
Source: Comscore Media Metrix® Multi-Platform, Custom-Defined List, Total Digital Audience – Desktop Persons 2+ and Total Mobile Persons 13+, October 2020, U.S. Based on CNN.com entity compared to a custom list of single brand competitors that are also in the News/Information Category. CNN Brand entity used prior to October 2018.
#1 IN MOBILE UNIQUE VISITORS IN OCTOBER 2020
CNN saw 128 million mobile unique visitors in October 2020 – the 22nd month in a row, and nearly two years, of more than 100 million unique visitors on mobile.
1. CNN.com – 128 Million Mobile Unique Visitors in October 2020
2. The New York Times Brand – 84 million mobile unique visitors
3. WashingtonPost.com – 82 million mobile unique visitors
4. FoxNews.com – 80 million mobile unique visitors
5. NBCNews.com – 75 million mobile unique visitors
Source: Comscore Mobile Metrix®, Custom-Defined List, Total Mobile Persons 13+, October 2020, U.S. Based on CNN.com entity compared to a custom list of single brand competitors that are also in the News/Information Category. CNN Brand entity used prior to October 2018.
#1 IN UNIQUE VIDEO VIEWERS IN SEPTEMBER 2020
CNN’s lead in video continued in September 2020 with 50 million unique video viewers (September 2020 data is the most current available). Of news outlets, CNN has been ranked #1 in unique video viewers since the metric was introduced more than 4 years ago. With more unique video viewers and minutes spent than any other news publisher, CNN continued to deliver users the most engaging video experience. CNN was the sixth-largest entity within the overall digital video ranking in September, following only YouTube, Hulu, Vevo, *Yahoo, and Twitch, making CNN the largest original video publisher.
1. CNN.com – 50 Million Multiplatform Video Unique Visitors in September 2020
2. FoxNews.com – 35.5 million unique video viewers
3. ABCNews.com Sites – 26 million unique video viewers
4. Yahoo News – 25 million unique video viewers
5. NBCNews.com – 23 million unique video viewers
Source: Comscore Video Metrix®, Custom-Defined List, Total Audience – Desktop Persons 2+ and Total Mobile Persons 18+ and OTT Persons 2+ where tagged, September 2020, U.S. Based on CNN.com entity compared to a custom list of single brand competitors that are also in the News/Information Category. Also based on CNN.com entity compared to a custom list of single brand competitors that exclusively provide original video content. CNN Brand entity used prior to October 2018. (September 2020 data is the most current available). Competitive claim outside of the news category is based on a custom list of single brand competitors from the Top 100 video properties list. *Yahoo refers to Yahoo-HuffPost News Network.
#1 IN MILLENNIAL REACH IN OCTOBER 2020
CNN again ranked as the largest millennial news brand with 37 million unique millennial multiplatform visitors in October (millennial defined as users between the ages of 18-34).
1. CNN.com – 37 Million Millennial Unique Multiplatform Visitors in October 2020
2. The New York Times Brand – 28 million millennial unique visitors
3. WashingtonPost.com – 23 million millennial unique visitors
4. USAToday.com – 19.3 million millennial unique visitors
5. NBCNews.com – 18.9 million millennial unique visitors
Source: Comscore Media Metrix® Multi-Platform, Custom-Defined List, Total Digital Audience Persons 18-34, October 2020, U.S. Based on CNN.com entity compared to a custom list of single brand competitors in the News/Information Category. CNN Brand entity used prior to October 2018.
#1 POLITICAL NEWS SOURCE IN OCTOBER 2020
In the final month before Election Day 2020, CNN Politics ranked again as the #1 political news destination in October 2020 with 86 million multiplatform unique visitors. CNN Politics has remained the #1 online political news outlet since March 2015 when the first person declared their candidacy for president in the 2016 race.
1. CNN Politics – 86 Million Multiplatform Unique Visitors in October 2020
2. TheHill.com – 51 million unique visitors
3. Politico.com – 46 million unique visitors
4. Fox News Politics – 40 million unique visitors
5. NBCNews.com Politics – 30 million unique visitors
Source: Comscore Media Metrix® Multi-Platform, News/Information – Politics, Total Digital Audience – Desktop 2+ and Total Mobile 13+, October 2020, U.S.; CNN Politics has been #1 in the competitive rank in multiplatform views since September 2015.
Editor-in-Chief | Seat42F, a leading source of entertainment news, information, television and movie resources.