Cable news consumption frequency in the U.S. by age 2022| ��ƽ��

Frequency of using cable news as a source of news among adults in the United States as of August 2022, by age group

Characteristic	Daily	A few times per week	Once per week	A few times per month	Once per month	Less than once per month	Never
18-34	10%	13%	8%	9%	5%	10%	45%
35-44	18%	18%	6%	7%	4%	11%	36%
45-64	25%	16%	6%	8%	2%	7%	36%
65+	32%	16%	3%	5%	2%	5%	37%

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Release date

October 2022

More information

Region

United States

Survey time period

August 11 to 17, 2022

Number of respondents

4,421 respondents

Age group

18 years and older

Method of interview

Online survey

Supplementary notes

Question: How often do you turn to the following sources for news? Cable news networks

Citation formats

Cable TV news consumption is on the decline. Adults aged between 18 and 34 years old were the least likely to use cable TV networks as a source of news, with a survey held in the United States in August 2022 revealing that 45 percent never did so. Younger consumers preferred social media sites for keeping up to date, and whilst their older peers turned to cable news more frequently, network news was still a more popular daily news source.

Falling cable news ratings

Back in 2017, FOX News, the leading cable news network in the United States, had an average of almost 470 thousand viewers in the primetime demo. With the exception of 2020 where news consumption soared during the COVID-19 pandemic, ratings have fallen consecutively each year, and by 2022, FOX’s average viewer count sank to 341 thousand. CNN and MSNBC saw even greater drops in their audiences, with the latter seeing its ratings fall by more than 2.5 times between 2017 and 2022.

Why the drop in ratings?

Cable and satellite TV is no longer the norm: only adults aged 60 or above express a preference for traditional TV over video streaming services and apps, and among certain age groups the share who preferred the latter was over 70 percent. Indeed, a 2022 survey found that the majority of Gen Z, millennials, and Gen X did not have a cable subscription. The main reason for cutting the cord was price, with over a third of adults saying that cable was simply too expensive.