Historically Super Bowl has been the most watched TV event in the US year after year. Last Year about 90 million people tuned in to watch the Super Bowl game between the New England patriots and Yew York Giants.

Obama inauguration, which is scheduled for 20 Jan 2009 is expected to be a big event, many predicting that it would even surpass the Super Bowl XLIII to be held on 12 days later on 01 Feb. Advertisers sure are hoping that even in these recession hit times the crowds will be pulled in for this one-off historic event. Considering that the Obama - McCain and the Palin Biden debates attracted about 60 million people, the Obama Inauguration should be even bigger.

The advantage that the Obama Inauguration has over Super Bowl is that it is a news event and is being telecast all over by the all the news channels around the world. Super Bowl on the other hand is restricted by promoters and official partners, which reduces visibility.

There have been bigger events than the Super Bowl. The most famous being the Bejing Olympics Opening Ceremony last year which attracted more than 2 billion viewers worldwide. Before this the Football world cup in Germany in 2006 had an average of 1.2 billion viewers per match. Another unforgettable TV event was the 1981, Prince Charles - Diana wedding which attracted a worldwide TV audience of 750 Million.

These numbers do not include the people who watch the events live online. Again in the case of Super Bowl all efforts are put in to reduce illegal streaming videos of the game, whereas many news channels are providing live streaming video online in case of the Obama inauguration. One can watch the Obama inauguration live online with streaming video from CNN,http://www.cnn.com/live/ Fox, http://www.foxnews.com/ and MSNBC, http://www.politics.msnbc.com/

I have a feeling that the Obama inauguration just might become the most watched TV event of the year without any competition.