Fact Check: Did Beyonce's NFL halftime show draw more viewers than Donald Trump’s inauguration?

WASHINGTON, DC: President Donald Trump's inauguration on Monday, January 20, was a memorable event that saw various celebrities attend the prestigious event. Many famous performers such as Carrie Underwood and Kid Rock performed during the mega event.

However, a rumor recently made its way online claiming that Beyonce's halftime show during an NFL game on Christmas Day 2024 attracted more viewers than Donald Trump's inauguration. But is there any truth to this? Let us find out below.

Claim: Beyonce's NFL halftime show drew more viewers than Donald Trump’s inauguration

On Wednesday, January 22, an X (formerly Twitter) account named @BuzzingPop made a post claiming, "Beyoncé’s NFL halftime show drew more viewers than Donald Trump’s second inauguration."

The post has so far garnered more than 2.6 million views on X, around 11K people have reshared the post with another 2.8k people sharing different views on the post.

A social media commented on the post, "Probably because most of his followers were at work," while one added, "Did you actually calculate all platforms? Doubt it."

Another stated, "Well one was during Christmas more people are gonna be watching because they are off," whereas another mentioned, "Loser flop."

One person commented, "I understand. Beyoncé should be president. Thank you for your guidance."

Partly true: Donald Trump's inauguration had an estimated 24.6M viewers on TV

The claim made on the viral social media post is not entirely true as President Donald Trump's inauguration was watched by an estimated 24.6 million viewers on television, according to Express US.

However, it must be noted that these are just the viewership numbers from television whereas the actual data, which would include numbers from other streaming platforms such as X and Paramount+, is not yet revealed.

Therefore, the claim cannot be called completely false or true since the official data is not yet available. Moreover, if it is compared to television views, then Beyonce's performance certainly had more viewers, which was reported to be 27 million, according to the Daily Mail.

Donald Trump's inauguration had fewer viewers than Joe Biden's 2021 inauguration

Donald Trump's inauguration viewership of 24.6 million on TV this year was less when compared with 33.8 million of Joe Biden’s 2021 inauguration, according to Nielsen.

Moreover, the number of viewers was also significantly down on the 30.6 million US citizens who watched coverage of Trump’s first inauguration in 2017, per Guardian.

Notably, the majority of viewers were aged 55 and over this time, with 17% of all US citizens in that age bracket watching, compared with 1.9% of people aged 18 to 34.

Furthermore, Trump’s viewing figures are the lowest since Barack Obama’s second inauguration, in 2013, which drew 20.5 million viewers.

The majority of people, ie, 10.67 million, watching Trump’s recent inauguration tuned in to Fox News and was followed by ABC News with 4.85 million, per the outlet.

This article contains remarks made on the Internet by individual people and organizations. MEAWW cannot confirm them independently and does not support claims or opinions being made online.