President Donald Trump has claimed that his inauguration set new “viewership” records, despite reports that the ceremony’s TV audience was the smallest since 2013.

Combining data from a website measuring online streaming, and other streaming data from X, formerly Twitter, Trump claimed more than 80 million viewers watched his inauguration. The president said this beat former president Ronald Reagan’s inauguration viewership record from 1981.

However, Trump did not attach supporting data to his post and appeared to overlook that Reagan and other presidents would have had a smaller broadcast audience by default.

What Did Trump Say on Truth Social?

“President Donald J. Trump’s Historic Inauguration Sets Viewership Record,” Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social.

“Data from Streams Charts shows that due to coverage of President Trump’s Inauguration, the News section of YouTube set a new ‘All Time Viewership Record’ with 9.6 million viewers.

“Additionally, the Inaugural Ceremony stream on President Donald J. Trump’s X account received a stunning 36.7 million views.

“In combination with TV viewership, an estimated 80.7 million viewers watched the President’s Inauguration, which beats the previous record of 42 million viewers with Ronald Reagan’s Inauguration in 1981.”

Newsweek has contacted a White House media representative via email for comment.

What Data Shows

While millions tuned in online to watch the inauguration, the data quoted by Trump inspires questions.

YouTube Viewership

For example, it is unclear how the “All Time Viewership Record” for YouTube’s “News” subsection can be used to meaningfully measure the popularity of the inauguration. This metric’s methodology was not attached to Trump’s message on Truth Social. Newsweek has contacted a media representative for YouTube via email for comment.

Streams Charts

The website Streams Charts posted on X on January 27, 2024, thanking Trump for mentioning its data. A statement from Streams Charts published on January 21, 2025, said that peak viewership in the News & Politics section on YouTube during the inauguration “hit 9,691,679, with 2,727 channels streaming.”

“Both of these numbers became records for the category.”

Newsweek has contacted a media representative for Streams Charts via email for information about its methodology and the records it compared against.

X (formerly Twitter)

The number of people who watched the inauguration via Donald Trump’s X account is also unclear. While the video stream as of Monday, January 27, 2025, says it has been viewed 36.9 million times, archives of that same video when it was recorded live on January 20, 2025, suggest it was smaller.

An archive result captured 17:10 UTC on January 20, 10 minutes into the start of the ceremony, showed it had been viewed 8.8 million times. An archive the following day showed that the number had increased to 30.1 million views.

As stated by X in its Help Center, regarding view counts for posts on the platform: “Multiple views may be counted if you view a post more than once, but not all views are unique. For example, you could look at a post on web and then on your phone, and that would count as two views.”

In a guide for “Media Studio Analytics”, X states it records “video view” counts when “a user watches a video for at least 2 seconds and sees at least 50% of the video player in-view.” Newsweek has contacted X via email for comment, asking if the same rule applied to streaming video.

According to Linda Yaccarino, who has served as the CEO of X Corp. since June 2023, Trump’s inauguration on X, formerly Twitter, received 4.8 billion impressions and 673 million video views. Yaccarino also said there was a 15 percent increase in posts compared to 2021.

Nielsen

As has been reported by Newsweek, data analytics company Nielsen reported that 24.6 million viewers watched Trump’s inauguration, fewer than former president Joe Biden‘s inauguration in 2021.

According to Nielsen, viewership for Trump’s inauguration peaked around 12:15 p.m. with 34.4 million, but the event otherwise received an average viewing audience of 24,589,000 people.

Nielsen based its findings on data from 15 networks airing coverage of the inauguration from 10:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. The networks were ABC, CBS, NBC, Merit Street Media, Telemundo, Univision, CNBC, CNN, CNNe, Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, MSNBC, Newsmax, NewsNation and PBS. It includes live viewers and those who watched later on.

According to Nielsen’s data, Trump’s inauguration viewership was the fourth-lowest since 1997, when Bill Clinton‘s second swearing-in totaled an audience of 21.6 million people. In 2012, Barack Obama‘s second inauguration recorded a total of 20.5 million viewers, while George W. Bush‘s second inauguration recorded a total of 15.5 million viewers in 2005. Second inaugrations typically attract fewer viewers.

Presidential Inauguration Viewership Comparison

Nielsen data shows that former president Ronald Reagan’s inauguration reached 41.8 million viewers in 1981.

Former president Barack Obama’s oath of office and inaugural speech in 2009 was watched by 37.8 million Americans.