CBC says historic audiences tuned in across its platforms for the French- and English-language Canadian federal leaders’ debates last week.
According to audience data supplied by the public broadcaster, 1.26 million Canadians tuned in to the French-language leaders’ debate last Wednesday on CBC News Network, more than double the number that tuned in for the same debate in September 2021. The 2+ average minute audience of 458,000 was 285% higher than 2021’s audience of 119,000. Streams of the French debate on cbcnews.ca also increased by 476% over 2021, while live views on CBC News’ YouTube channel were up 80%.
For the English-language debate on Thursday, over 2.6 million Canadians tuned in to CBC and CBC News Network. CBC was the most-watched network for the debate, with its broadcast the most-watched primetime program in Canada on April 17. CBC and CBC News Network drew a combined 2+ average minute audience of 1.24 million, an increase of 29% compared to the 2021 English-language debate broadcast.
On CBC Radio, 850,000 Canadians tuned in, an increase of 80% compared to the 2021 debate.
There were 3 million unique visitors to cbcnews.ca and the CBC News app on April 17, with video views up 85% over Sept. 9, 2021, the date of the last English-language debate. The debate was streamed more than 700,000 times across cbcnews.ca, the CBC News app, CBC Gem, CBC News YouTube and CBC News TikTok. The livestream captured 384,700 total views on CBC News’ YouTube, and was the second-highest livestream by watch time since the beginning of the year, after former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s announcement of Canada’s retaliatory tariffs on Feb. 1.
