Over the past two weeks, most of WWE and AEW's major wrestling programs hit record low numbers across both cable and streaming, and in a recent edition of the "Wrestling Observer Newsletter," Dave Meltzer provided some insight on the decline in viewership for both promotions.
Last Monday, "WWE Raw" posted their lowest average viewership on Netflix, which came as a surprise to Meltzer who usually expects the red brand to draw their worst totals when the NFL season is underway. For two weeks, "Raw" aired live from Europe, meaning the show broadcasted in the U.S during the afternoon, which seemingly had a negative affect on viewership. Furthermore, Meltzer believes that "Raw's" numbers for the August 25 episode were manipulated, with Netflix initially having two versions of the show available, one of which featured commercials. Netflix claimed the final rating was 2.6 million viewers, which Meltzer feels is nearly impossible given that more people had to watch the longer version of "Raw," estimating that the real number is closer to 2.1 million.
As for the August 29 edition of "SmackDown," having the show air on a five-hour delay in the U.S on cable seemed to make the largest impact, with the program only drawing 1,147,000 viewers, making itthe lowest number the program has recorded aside from multiple broadcasts on FS 1 in the past.Usually, the blue brand's least watched episodes throughout any year have been those that air on holidays, but even the 4th of July episode of "SmackDown" performed better than last week's edition of the show. That said, "SmackDown" did face intense competition, withfour college football games placing above it on cable.
The September 2 episode of "WWE NXT" was the only wrestling program to not hit record low numbers, with Meltzer outlining that the show drew655,000 viewers despite airing during the same time slot as "America's Got Talent." "NXT" increased its audience by 6.3% from the previous week, while also ranking third among men across all networks in the 18-49 demo. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for some of WWE's reality programs or exclusive shows, with "WWE LFG" posting 87,000 viewers and their Greatest Moments show on A&E drawing 116,000 viewers at 9 p.m due to college football.
TBS and TNT were also unable to escape low ratings, with "AEW Dynamite" and "AEW Collision" both performing terribly this past week. The September 3 edition of "Dynamite" drew 472,000 viewers and an 0.11 in the 18-49 demographic, with both ratings being the lowest numbers the show has recorded in their normal Wednesday night time slot. Along with "Dynamite" ranking outside of the top 20 on cable for the day, the show lost over 100,000 viewers from the previous week, which had an audience of 585,000. "Collision" also drew under the 200,000 viewer mark for the first time since February this year, with college football once again proving to dominate its competition.
Meltzer noted that AEW's viewership has taken a hit since beginning their residency at the 2300 Arena in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He explained that the venue lacking a "major league look" has seemingly made a significant difference, with "Dynamite" being down in viewership by 33.6% since last month, and "Collision" losing half their audience in just a few weeks. Meltzer continued to note that "Dynamite" ranked below programs such asNASCAR, "Smackdown," five sessions of the U.S. Open tennis tournament and nine college football related shows. Overall, even with "Collision" posting solid DVR numbers or AEW still generating a strong audience on HBO MAX, Meltzer feels that there's nothing positive about the company's ratings last week.
Finally, Meltzer explained that wrestling is not the exception for weaker ratings as of late, with cable stations such as TBS, TNT and USA hitting record lows as well, with the return of football and cord-cutting being the main reasons for the decline in viewership.
If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit "Wrestling Observer Newsletter" with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.
