It seems only fitting that a reality TV presidential election should end in the most cliched of gimmicks: a television cliffhanger.
A full map of the television viewing audience is still forming but overnight audience data reports that at least 72Â million viewers in the United States were watching election coverage on the free-to-air networks and major cable news channels.
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Trump wins: celebrations and concerns
There are plenty of reactions from Australian politicians following Donald Trump's US election win.
NBC carved off the largest network audience with 11.97 million viewers.
ABC followed with 9.68 million, CBS with 8.8 million and Fox with 4.28 million.
CNN was the most watched news channel with 13.3 million viewers, while Fox News drew 12.1 million and MSNBCÂ drew 5.9 million.
In total 40.77 million people watched on free-to-air networks and 31.4 million on the three major cable news channels.
And that overall total - 72.17 million - will lift when adjusted data is released as the overnight data only covers the 8pm-11pm period.
Most channels extended their coverage into the early hours of the morning as candidates Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton carved off electoral college votes in the race to the presidency; the winner was not called until 3am, east coast time.
In a sign that the election was keenly watched by America's Latino community, the Spanish-language networks Univision and Telemundo drew 3.89 million and 2.16 million viewers respectively.
In 2012, when Barack Obama and Joe Biden defeated Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, television coverage of the election drew 66.8 million across 13 networks.Â
And in 2006, when Obama and Biden defeated John McCain and Sarah Palin, television coverage of the election drew 71 million across 14 networks.