The national broadcast networks combined with local TV affiliates garnered nearly half of all TV midterms election coverage last week according to a report.
The report by Madhive Maverick AI analyzed how viewers consumed news across televisions, connected devices, and streaming platforms on Election Night, Nov. 3.
It found that by 10 pm ET, more than half of all TVs in use were tuned to the news, four times more than a usual Tuesday evening and that between 8 pm and midnight ET, news accounted for half of all total TV viewing, compared to one in seven on an average Tuesday.
Broadcast and local stations captured 48% of total news viewing during prime time, which for Tuesday was 7 pm to midnight, compared to 29% on regular Tuesdays. Cable news accounted for 41%, down from 55% on an average Tuesday and streaming news was 11%, a decrease of 16% for a normal Tuesday.
Among broadcasters, NBC News led the field, averageng 6.8 million viewers during its primetime broadcasts.
Spanish language TV’s share of the growth nearly doubled to 7.6%, which accounted for 25% of all minutes viewed in California, Madhive said.
States with the highest interest in their elections also scored high viewership, with Texas coming out on top. In that state Madhive said 63 out of 100 TVs were tuned to election news in primetime, with 43 out of 100 visiting news via phones or computers and 26 per 100 via streaming.
Iowa saw the highest increase, with primetime news viewing reaching 54 in 100 TVs in use, representing 3.5 times the normal Tuesday audience.
Maine viewers stayed up the latest, where by 12:30 a.m. on Wednesday morning, half of all TVs were still on, five times the normal rate.
Web traffic also soared, with 43 in 100 active household internet connections visiting a news site or app on a phone or computer between 7:00 p.m. and midnight, nearly double the 24 in 100 from the prior week.
To determine its numbers, Madhive's smart-TV panel, tracked over 3.5 million TVs active in prime time (defined as 10+ minutes spent on election/news content) compared against Tuesdays October 13 and 20.
Digital data was derived from ad-supported web, app, and streaming activity across over 99 million household internet connections (excluding shared and carrier IP addresses) compared against Tuesday, October 27, 2026.
