CNN and Fox News Feud Over Who Has More Page Views on Their Websites

There’s been a bit of a dustup between CNN and Fox News as to who is winning the battle over page views so far in 2018.

Both networks are claiming victory over the stats compiled by comScore in January 2018. Fox News touted that FoxNews.com attracted 1.43 billion multiplatform total views, which notably would be the first time that the site outpaced CNN.com, which attracted 1.409 billion views.

“FoxNews.com has reached new heights with its digital presence by setting records in time spent on our digital platform to engage our viewers online,” Fox News Channel’s president of news Jay Wallace said in a press release. “We have always had the most loyal audience and are now pleased to say we have the most engaged online viewership as well.”

However, CNN is also celebrating because the comScore shows that the entire CNN digital platform outperformed FoxNews.com’s 1.43 billion page views with 1.69 billion, arguing that CNN.com is only a “subset.”

“For January 2018, CNN Digital continued its winning streak, registering more multiplatform visitors, mobile visitors, video starts and a greater social reach than any other news outlet for the month,” CNN stated in their own press release.

They also threw some shade at their cable news competitor.

“CNN also beat Fox News in page views. Reports to the contrary are bananas,” CNN said.

Well, Wallace of Fox News also refuted CNN.

“Just as we overtook CNN 16 years ago to become the leader in cable news, Fox News has once again surged ahead on digital after an extensive upgrade and expansion that began less than a year ago,” Wallace said in a statement to Mediaite. “Clearly, suffering yet another loss to Fox News has driven CNN bananas.”

In response to Wallace’s comments, CNN VP of Communications and Digital Partnerships Matt Dormic sent out the following tweet on Friday:

I’m assuming @FoxNews‘s Jay Wallace faxed this statement to @thehill bc his ignorance about the Internet is on full display. ???? https://t.co/OjXGjpi9co

— Matt Dornic (@mdornic) February 16, 2018

“Clearly Fox News has extended their habit of intentionally misleading their viewers and users to claims about web traffic,” Dormic told Mediaite in response to Wallace’s comments. “As defined within comScore, Fox News is comparing the page views of their entire site to a subset of CNN’s traffic which does not account for significant beats like media and technology.”

He added, “It must be demoralizing to lose to CNN across the board — especially in a category as irrelevant as page views. My heart goes out to them.”