Kelly Ripa’s New Co-Host Is Ryan Seacrest, Report Says

Ryan Seacrest will be Kelly Ripa’s new permanent co-host on daytime “Live With Kelly” chat show, CNN reported Monday. The report follows Ripa’s tweet Sunday in which she said her new co-host would be announced Monday.

Two sources told CNN Seacrest will be announced the new co-host on Monday’s morning show.

At least 65 temporary co-hosts appeared alongside Ripa on the show. On Sunday, Ripa teased her Twitter followers by sharing a video of herself sipping from a mug illustrated with “Live With Kelly & ?”

After taking the sip, she said: “Tune in tomorrow. Trust me!”

Sources told Variety that Ripa’s co-host will not be from most frequent guest hosts who appeared for nearly a year. This is likely to rule out Fred Savage, Jerry O’Connell, Andy Cohen and Anderson Cooper, the report noted.

In April 2016, Michael Strahan announced his departure from “Live” for a full-time position on “Good Morning America.” The announcement surprised viewers and caught Ripa off guard. Reports said she was “blindsided” by the news and took a weeklong break from the show after the announcement. She admitted to being upset at not being kept in the loop about Strahan’s decision.

“What transpired, though, over the course of a few days has been extraordinary in the sense that it started a much greater conversation about communication and consideration and, most importantly, respect in the workplace. Since we're being honest, I don't consider this just a workplace. This is my second home,” she said at the time.

After returning to the show, she said the weeklong break helped her get more more perspective on the situation and that she was happy for Strahan, who joined “Good Morning America” in May 2016.

Speaking to People magazine, Ripa explained last year who would be her right co-host for the show.

“You want somebody working there who’s comfortable working there. That’s how you figure it’s like a puzzle. It’s very much like an equation, an algorithm. Let’s see, if we put somebody here and somebody there, and, ‘Oh, this guy really likes to talk about this,’ or, ‘This guy’s really good here,’ or, ‘This lady is amazing,’ or, ‘She was great last time, let’s give her another shot,’” Ripa said at the time.

Addressing the prolonged search in December during an appearance on Watch What Happens Live, Ripa further explained: “We really didn’t set a timeframe for ourselves, we just wanted to wait until we found the right person.”

In December, Ripa said there wasn’t really a timeline for finding a permanent host.

“We really didn’t set a timeframe for ourselves, we just wanted to wait until we found the right person. What we didn’t anticipate was that we would have such an outpouring of interest, so our list got very long very quickly. So we’ve been trying to keep it as narrow as possible, but then people pop up,” she said on "Watch What Happens Live."