This year, more news organizations live streamed the U.S. presidential debates on YouTube than ever before, and we saw record-breaking interest from the YouTube community. The 2016 presidential debates rank as the three most-viewed political live streams of all time. In total, these debates drove 8.5M live watch hours and averaged 1.7M live peak concurrent viewers.

Last night’s final presidential debate delivered:

• 2.8M live watch hours, nearly five times higher than 2012
• 1.7M live peak concurrent viewers, over four times higher than 2012
• Over 140 million views on all debate-related videos

Elections-related YouTube searches are also at an all-time high. Searches for U.S. election content are up 547 percent compared to this time in the last presidential race.

Throughout the debates, millions of viewers tuned in and stayed engaged. The average live session duration was 22 minutes across all three presidential debates and concurrent viewership consistently peaked towards the end of the debate.

In true YouTube fashion, Americans weren’t the only ones involved. Have a look at who was watching the most around the globe:




With only 18 days until U.S. Election Day voters are preparing to head to the polls. If the voter registration deadline in your state hasn’t passed, register today! It only takes 1 min., 34 seconds.

Kurt Wilms, Product Lead, Live Streaming at YouTube, recently watched “The Third Presidential Debate.”

With just 21 days remaining, the U.S. presidential election is top of mind for voters across the country.

Over the past three debates you’ve come to YouTube to follow live coverage from more news organizations than ever before. And Wednesday’s third and final presidential debate will be no exception.

Pick your favorite news channel and tune in to the debate starting at 9 p.m. ET on Wednesday, October 19. Here is where you can watch live on YouTube:

• NBC News
• CBS News
• Fox News
• PBS
• Washington Post
• Univision
• Telemundo

You can also join The Young Turks and Complex News on the ground reporting from Las Vegas, Nev., using YouTube Live directly from their phones.

Can’t decide on one stream? Check out youtube.com/news to follow all of the coverage.

And if the voter registration deadline in your state hasn’t passed, register today! It only takes 1 min., 34 seconds.

Brandon Feldman, YouTube News and Politics, recently watched “How Voters Decide.”

Sunday’s highly-anticipated debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump drew new levels of interest from the YouTube community. The closely watched live debate and on-demand videos surrounding it generated over 124M views since Sunday, representing a 40 percent increase compared to the first presidential debate, which drove 88M views.

Of course many viewers came to YouTube to watch the debate live and we saw over 1.5M peak concurrent viewers, five times higher than the second presidential debate in 2012, and over 2.5M live watch hours, nearly six times higher than 2012.

Those viewers were highly engaged as well. On average, they watched the debate for nearly 25 minutes. And they came from all over the globe. After the U.S., top countries by viewership were: Canada, Mexico, Australia, Great Britain and Vietnam.

While much of the attention was on the debate, commentary continues to be a hot topic on YouTube. Sketches from some of the most popular late night shows were amongst the weekend’s most-viewed videos leading up to the debate. If you’re looking for a laugh after Sunday’s heated debate, check out Jimmy Fallon’s Trump calls Madea and Saturday Night Live’s Donald Trump vs. Hillary Clinton Debate Cold Open.

The final presidential debate is next Wednesday, Oct. 19, and we’ll bring you all the action live on YouTube from Las Vegas, Nev.

Brandon Feldman, YouTube News & Politics, recently watched the second presidential debate.

As U.S. voters prepare to head to the polls in just over a month, all eyes are on Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump as they debate for a second time -- and like the last two debates, you can head to YouTube to watch the candidates take the stage.

Just choose a news channel on YouTube and join us live from St. Louis, Mo., on Sunday at 9 p.m. ET:

• NBC News
• CBS News
• Fox News
• PBS
• Washington Post
• Univision
• Telemundo

Stay up to speed on U.S. election news, including live coverage, by heading to youtube.com/news. And if you haven’t already, register to vote. It only takes 1 min, 34 seconds!

Brandon Feldman, YouTube News and Politics, recently watched “The Vice-Presidential Debate.”