According to The American Presidency Project, the average length of spoken State of the Union addresses has gotten longer over the years. Going back to 1964, Lyndon Johnson averaged 50 minutes and 38 seconds for his addresses. Richard Nixon’s average was 15 minutes less at only 35 minutes and 26 seconds, which is the lowest average for any president.
However, entering the 1990s, U.S. Presidents seemed to become more long-winded. Bill Clinton was the first president to crack the hour mark for his average State of the Union length, hitting the 1 hour and 14-minute mark. George W. Bush kept it moderate, averaging under an hour in his State of the Union addresses, while both Barack Obama and Donald Trump would regularly exceed that mark, with Trump giving the longest speeches averaging 1 hour and 20 minutes. Obama’s averaged about an hour and two minutes.
It should be noted that this is the length of the speech when spoken. What’s more, these numbers don’t appear to factor in the numerous applause breaks that happen throughout the night.
