All about Technology: EXPLAINED: How to watch the CNN Republican Primary Presidential Debate live stream

Wednesday 16 September 2015

EXPLAINED: How to watch the CNN Republican Primary Presidential Debate live stream

One presidential debate live stream down, 10 to go. You can watch the second 2016 Republican Presidential debate on CNN tonight, September 16 before heading over to CNBC in October.

Like the previous debate held on Fox News, CNN's forum will have two segments. The later segment is the one to watch, as it pits front-runners Donald Trump and Jeb Bush against the eight other primetime contenders, including newcomer to the main stage, Carly Fiorina. The CNN debate will be held at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California and starts at 8pm ET / 5pm PT.

The first section, on the other hand, will only star four candidates – Rick Santorum, Bobby Jindal, George Pataki and Lindsey Graham – and the CNN live stream starts at 6pm ET / 3pm PT.

In case you can't make it to a TV in time for the debate, don't worry. There are plenty of ways to watch it online or a mobile device like an iPad.

Watch the CNN Republican debate live stream

The upcoming showdown is going to be legen-wait for it-dary, legendary, and CNN doesn't want a single person to miss out on the 11-person political battle royale, so you can watch it online.

While Fox required users to authenticate their cable subscription with a username and password, CNN said in a statement to Fortune that Wednesday's debate is going to be available "across CNN's mobile platforms without authentication. Users won't have to log-in to see the stream, [and] it will be available as soon as they visit CNN.com or access one of our apps." Now there's no excuse to go into work on Thursday without watching the event.

CNN Debate Live Stream Watch Online

That means iOS and Android devices, including the iPad Air 2, iPhone 6 and Samsung Galaxy Note 5, will be able to get into the action by using CNN's mobile app while desktop and laptop users should simply head over to the CNN debate microsite.

As you might imagine, this surge of traffic might periodically cause the stream to buffer or stall from time-to-time, according to CNN Head of U.S editorial operations Andrew Morse told Bustle that he and his team have been meeting daily and assures viewers that CNN can handle such viewership surges.

Presidential debate time and schedule

So now that you know where to watch the CNN debate online, it's probably a good idea to go over when the debate is going to be on. Like the debate on Fox News, Wednesday's CNN debate will be held in two sessions, session A and session B.

Session A kicks off the event at 6pm ET / 3pm PT with the four lowest rated politicians in the polls – Rick Santorum, Bobby Jindal, George Pataki and Lindsey Graham. Each has more than 1% of the vote in three separate polls.

CNN Debate Live Stream Watch Online

Why is it so small this time around? Former Texas Governor Rick Perry has recently dropped from the race while former HP executive Carly Fiorina has garnered enough popularity in the polls to be elevated to the later debate, leaving only four candidates.

The last debate live stream was only about one-hour in length, though, that doesn't necessarily mean this one will follow suit. However, you can almost certainly expect some sort of pre-show and post-wrap content on CNN once the second session ends.

Session B, however, is the one to watch. It will start at 8pm ET / 5pm PT and is scheduled for a full two hours.

You can expect to see all the crew from August's debate back for round two from front-runners like real estate mogul Donald Trump and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, to some of the lesser supported candidates like current New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and current Ohio governor John Kasich.

CNN Debate Live Stream Watch Online