News Broadcasting
CNN named number one international news brand in India and Asia Pacific
MUMBAI: CNN has been named the number one international news brand according to the latest Ipsos Affluent Survey Asia Pacific, reaching an unrivalled one in three upscale consumers in the region. CNN is consumed by more affluents in Asia Pacific in all daily, weekly and monthly metrics, as well as on all platforms of TV, online and mobile. In India, CNN is the leader amongst international news brands in multiplatform and digital reach, and also accumulates more TV viewers each month than BBC World News.
Among international news brands and across platforms, CNN is the preferred destination for India’s affluent audience, with 20% monthly reach – significantly ahead of the next-placed brand (BBC World News). CNN is also the leading international news brand in terms of monthly TV reach as well as digital (websites & apps) reach, where CNN has a lead of over 50% compared to the next-placed international news brand (BBC World News).
At the regional, Asia Pacific level, the survey shows every month CNN is consumed by over a third (34%) of the region’s affluent audience across all platforms, which is 40% more than the next largest news brand (BBC World News 24%) and twice as many as the third-placed brand (CNBC 16%). Each month CNN also reaches a large proportion of elusive target groups such as frequent business travelers (65%), opinion leaders* (51%), and top management (46%).
On TV, CNN is the most watched international news channel with 27% monthly, 18% weekly and 6% daily reach. This is far ahead of the other news channels including BBC World News (18% monthly, 12% weekly and 4% daily), CNBC (12%, 8%, 2%), Channel NewsAsia (10%, 7%, 4%) and Bloomberg TV (7%, 5%, 1%). In a single week CNN reaches 99% as many upscale consumers as BBC World News does in an entire month. The research also shows over the course of a month 29% of CNN TV viewers watch CNN exclusively, watching no other news or business channel**.
On digital platforms (websites and apps), CNN is ahead of all news and entertainment brands with 54% higher monthly reach than the next largest brand (CNN 9% monthly reach versus BBC World News 5%).
CNN’s continual dominance extends beyond Asia Pacific with the Ipsos Affluent Global survey also released today showing CNN reaches 40% of upscale consumers and decision-makers in Europe, Middle East, Africa, Latin America and Asia combined. This audience is larger than all other news competitors in every metric across TV and digital platforms. The IPSOS Affluent Global findings follow CNN registering a global digital audience of 99 million Unique Visitors in comScore’s August data – over 25 million ahead of the BBC (73 million)****.
Rani Raad, Chief Commercial Officer, CNN International: “These results prove once again CNN has the winning combination of quality and quantity. CNN has an unrivalled ability to connect with affluent consumers and hard-to-reach groups and does so in large numbers. It’s been an extraordinary year for major news stories and these results are testament to the relevance and importance of CNN’s first-class journalism in Asia and all corners of the globe.”
News Broadcasting
News TV viewership jumps 33 per cent as West Asia war draws audiences
BARC Week 8 data shows news share rising to 8 per cent despite T20 World Cup
NEW DELHI: Even as individual television news channel ratings remain under a temporary pause, the genre itself is seeing a clear surge in audience attention.
According to the latest data from Broadcast Audience Research Council India, television news recorded a 33 per cent jump in genre share in Week 8 of 2026, covering February 28 to March 6.
The news genre accounted for 8 per cent of total television viewership during the week, up from 6 per cent the previous week. The spike in attention coincided with escalating geopolitical tensions involving the United States, Israel and Iran, which have kept global headlines firmly fixed on West Asia.
The rise is notable because it came at a time when cricket was dominating television screens. The high-stakes stages of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup, including the Super 8 fixtures and semi-finals, were being broadcast during the same period.
Despite the cricket frenzy, viewers appeared to be toggling between sport and global affairs, boosting the overall share of news programming.
The surge in genre share comes even as the government has enforced a one-month pause on publishing ratings for individual news channels. The move followed regulatory scrutiny of the television ratings ecosystem.
While channel-level rankings remain temporarily out of sight, the genre-level data suggests that when global tensions escalate, audiences continue to turn to television news for real-time updates.
