How do audiences for Fox News, Newsmax, and OANN compare by cable TV prime‑time ratings?
Executive summary
Fox News’s prime‑time audience dwarfs Newsmax’s by an order of magnitude most weeks — Fox routinely posts primetime averages in the low millions while Newsmax is measured in the low hundreds of thousands — and available reporting in the provided sources contains no usable OANN primetime ratings, so any direct three‑way numeric ranking cannot be completed from these documents alone [1] [2] [3].
1. Measured primetime audiences: Fox News sits in the millions
Nielsen‑based reporting and news trade outlets show Fox News averaging from roughly 1.5 million to more than 2.7 million primetime viewers depending on the week or quarter cited — for example a post‑election seven‑day window reported Fox with about 3 million primetime viewers and other weekly snapshots show 2.121 million and 1.515 million in different weeks, and year‑to‑date summaries place Fox’s 2025 primetime average in the multi‑million range [1] [4] [5] [2] [6].
2. Newsmax: hundreds of thousands, with volatility and occasional spikes
By contrast the available figures for Newsmax place its primetime audience in the low hundreds of thousands: one measurement lists Newsmax at about 156,000 primetime viewers for the week ending Jan. 4, 2026, while a year‑summary placed Newsmax with a 2025 primetime average near 241,000 viewers and individual shows like Rob Schmitt Tonight have been cited with substantially higher single‑program audiences — indicating program‑level peaks but a much smaller network primetime footprint than Fox [3] [2] [6].
3. OANN: absent from the sourced rating snapshots
None of the provided sources supply a Nielsen primetime number or ranked position for One America News Network (OANN), so the documents at hand do not permit a sourced, quantitative comparison that includes OANN; this absence means any claim about OANN’s relative primetime rank would be unsupported by the supplied reporting (no source).
4. Relative scale and what it means for reach
Putting these numbers side by side shows a clear scale gap: Fox’s primetime averages measured in millions translate into dominant market share (some reports attribute Fox more than two‑thirds of cable news primetime in specific windows), while Newsmax’s few‑hundred‑thousand viewers reflect a niche, smaller audience despite occasional spikes and month‑to‑month growth claims in certain demographics [1] [2] [7].
5. Demographics, engagement and headline claims
Coverage notes that Fox’s primetime strength often extends to coveted demos (examples cite adults 25–54 and adults 18–49 in different snapshots) and that Newsmax has at times claimed demographic gains — including press statements about jumps in older demos and engagement — but those corporate or promotional claims should be balanced against independent Nielsen snapshots that still show Newsmax far behind Fox in raw primetime viewers [1] [7] [6].
6. Data caveats, timing and potential agendas
Ratings swing week‑to‑week, quarter‑to‑quarter and around events (election nights, Super Bowl lead‑ins), so single‑week figures can overstate momentum; many of the sources mix independent Nielsen reporting (Adweek, trade outlets) with self‑reported or promotional items from networks or interested parties — Fox’s own release touts record years and Newsmax/third‑party press releases emphasize growth — underscoring the need to treat claims from networks as having implicit promotional agendas and to rely on Nielsen‑cited trade reporting for comparability [5] [8] [7].
7. Bottom line
Based on the supplied reporting, Fox News consistently commands primetime audiences measured in the millions and therefore dominates the cable‑news primetime landscape; Newsmax runs significantly smaller, in the low hundreds of thousands with episodic program spikes and demographic growth claims, and OANN’s primetime numbers are not present in these sources so a complete three‑way numeric ranking cannot be produced from this dataset (p1_s2; [2]; [3]; no source for OANN).