Tens of millions of Americans will tune in tonight at 9 p.m. Eastern to watch President Biden and Donald Trump take the stage at an audience-free CNN studio in Atlanta for their first debate of the 2024 presidential campaign. It could be the most consequential 90 minutes of the race.

Almost everyone already has opinions about both candidates, most of them negative. But as our national political correspondent Shane Goldmacher told me, many people haven’t seen either Biden or Trump speak at length in a long time: “This is a chance to shape public perspective straight with the voters who matter, and because there is not another debate until September, those perceptions could be lasting,” he said.

The Times will carry the debate live, with real-time analysis and fact checks from 60 of my colleagues.

Expectations for tonight are higher for Trump than they are for Biden, according to a recent Times poll. However, Shane said, there might be more at stake for Biden: His team pushed for the historically early debate to nudge voters away from viewing the election as an up-or-down vote on Biden’s tenure, and to allow more time for them to consider the profound differences between the candidates.

“It also may be his biggest platform of the entire race to dispel, or at least quiet, widespread concerns about his fitness to serve and finish a second term,” Shane said.

What to expect: Here’s what our reporters think will be the candidates’ lines of attack, and what their 2020 debates suggest about the rematch.