Last night's debate was the least-watched in the election so far
An average of 14 million viewers tuned into the Republican presidential debate on Wednesday, according to the network.
Of those, 3.9 million landed in CNBC's target audience of adults between the ages of 25 and 54 and 3.4 million belonged to the advertiser-coveted 18- to 49-year-old demographic.
First, the bad news: The debate that focused on economic issues, titled "Your Money, Your Vote," was the least-viewed of the three GOP debates, though that was expected.
The previous GOP debates brought in 24 million and 23 million viewers for Fox News in August and CNN in September, respectively. Even the Democratic debate earlier this month did better than CNBC. It was viewed by 15.3 million viewers on CNN.
The good news is that CNBC set a few network records. The debate came in much higher than the network's last presidential debate in November 2011, which was watched by just 3.1 million viewers. In fact, Wednesday's debate is CNBC's most-watched program ever.
Additionally, business makeover show "The Profit," which aired after the debate, averaged 1.9 million total viewers. That made it the most-watched episode of the series, and Wednesday was CNBC's highest-rated night ever.
CNBC's vice president of communications Brian Steel responded, "People who want to be president of the United States should be able to answer tough questions."
All things considered, CNBC can celebrate the huge amount of ad revenue it collected during the debate. As Business Insider previously reported, the news network charged $250,000 and upward for 30 seconds of advertising time during the program. A CNBC representative confirmed to BI that the ad time sold out.
The next GOP debate is on November 10 from the Milwaukee Theater in Wisconsin. It will be hosted by Fox Business and the Wall Street Journal. Gerard Baker, Neil Cavuto, and Maria Bartiromo are set to moderate.