“Viewer Fatigue” Hitting Fox News Ratings, Lachlan Murdoch Says

Fox CEO Lachlan Murdoch addressed Fox News‘ recent ratings declines on the company’s quarterly earnings call Monday morning.

Murdoch acknowledged the “difficult” comparison to last year on the call, even as CNN and MS NOW are up significantly in the midterm election cycle.

“What we are seeing is some viewer fatigue, where our viewers have gone through an incredible news cycle last year with the inauguration, the Charlie Kirk tragedy, DOGE, flooding, it was an incredible news cycle last year,” Murdoch said, comparing what is happening to the 2006 midterms, when President George W. Bush was midway through his second term. “Those viewers are not switching to another news channel, they are just fatigued and watching slightly less television overall. We have seen this playbook, and we know how to move through it.”

Indeed, Fox News is still beating CNN and MS NOW combined, and Murdoch quipped on the call that they really shouldn’t be called Fox News’ “peers” given the ratings discrepancy, with Fox preferring to compare Fox News to the four major broadcast networks.

Still, the ratings declines are a problem for Fox and Fox News, which will need to turn things around at some point. But as Murdoch noted, Fox has traveled down this road before, and a 2028 cycle will start sooner rather than later, with an entirely new slate of candidates to focus on. But first, it will need to navigate the next few months.

Murdoch also said that Fox News has benefited from the midterms with some $50 million in advertising revenue attributed to Fox’s national networks, alongside $250 million at its local stations and $50 million at Tubi. The competitive nature across the country means that Fox is a major beneficiary, even if Fox News’ ratings are not.