US Election Sees Guardian’s Single Biggest Day For Digital Traffic

The US election saw the Guardian record its highest-ever digital traffic, reaching more than 190 million page views and 52.9 million unique browsers worldwide in 24 hours – exceeding all previous traffic records by an enormous margin.

The Guardian’s previous highest days for traffic were the announcement of the lockdown in the EU on 16 March 2020, the UK lockdown on 23 March 2020, and the day after US election day on 9 November 2016, the Guardian said in a press release.

Traffic on 4 November was more than double each of these days, with traffic to the Guardian’s digital platforms topping 100 million page views just after 1pm GMT and peaking at nearly 200,000 page views per minute at 7:25pm GMT.

The Guardian’s live results tracker alone has received over 94 million page views so far since launch. The tracker, a collaborative project from the Guardian’s newsroom, visual journalism, designers and engineering teams, has continued to gain millions of page views throughout Thursday.

US traffic achieved records too, reaching 48.4 million page views and 24.2 million unique browsers on the day following the election – each more than three times the equivalent day in 2016.

Guardian editor-in-chief Katharine Viner said: “This US election has gripped audiences right around the world, and will have truly global consequences. The Guardian’s reporting, led by our talented US team with support from colleagues in the UK, Australia and our network of global correspondents, has attracted an immense and record-breaking audience for high-quality, trusted news.”