‘All Elite Wrestling: Dynamite‘ faced stiff competition on Wednesday night with two high-stakes MLB Postseason games going on. That coupled with perhaps other potential factors led to the AEW flagship drawing its lowest viewership and ratings numbers in five months.
Dynamite averaged 800,000 viewers according to Wrestlenomics and SportsTVRatings. The show also earned a 0.28 rating in the key P18-49 demographic. 800,000 viewers is the lowest figure for the popular wrestling show since May 3, when the show averaged 776,000 viewers with a similar 0.28 demographic rating. Wrestlenomics wrote that the figure the 10/4 episode of Dynamite recorded was the lowest since earning 0.24 on June 28.
AEW Dynamite last night on TBS:
800,000 viewers
P18-49 rating: 0.28 pic.twitter.com/CuyiP1LAef— Wrestlenomics (@wrestlenomics) October 5, 2023
The show’s big angle going in was the arrival of a new wrestler to the company. WWE lifer Edge debuted in the promotion last Sunday during its ‘WrestleDream’ event in Seattle. Now going by his real name, Adam Copeland, there was plenty of hype and attention on them. His AEW debut has recorded over 4.5 million views on YouTube. But that was evidently not enough to attract a significant audience to the show.
The show peaked at just 852,000 viewers, according to quarter-hour data provided by Wrestlenomics. That came during the final segment between Copeland and Christian Cage, his former longtime tag team partner. Dynamite’s yearly average dipped from 882,128 viewers to 880,075 viewers after this week’s figure. So this week’s number was well below their average number.
Two weeks ago, AEW produced its annual ‘Grand Slam’ event that averaged 984,000 viewers. But the show has only logged over 900,000 viewers three times over the last 16 weeks. The show has averaged 878,625 viewers over the last eight weeks.
This past Tuesday, WWE NXT, the company’s developmental proving ground brand, earned an average of 857,000 viewers and a 0.22 P18-49 rating. That was the highest mark the show had seen since October 2020. And while Dynamite’s figure rated higher, NXT’s viewership did surpass AEW’s this week. NXT has also seen a recent uptick in ratings. The show has averaged 731,000 viewers over the last eight weeks and has hit over 800,000 three times in the last four weeks.
WWE is loading up next week’s broadcast as well, for good reason. AEW will move to Tuesday for one week only because of TBS’ MLB Postseason coverage. So the two shows will go ‘head-to-head’ against each other, and WWE has loaded up the card with appearances scheduled for John Cena, Cody Rhodes, and Paul Heyman. Multi-time Women’s Champion Asuka will wrestle prodigy Roxanne Perez, and NXT Women’s Champion and former WrestleMania main eventer Becky Lynch likely will be in the house as well.
Dynamite now is in an interesting spot. It’s true that it’s difficult to compare different nights on TV. Viewing habits differ by the day. But the perception for a long time, at least online, was that AEW overwhelmed NXT. And it’s fair to say that the data does back that up. There’s levels to the comparison too — NXT is WWE’s third show and the least-watched, Dynamite is AEW’s flagship and frequently most-watched — but that’s never stopped anyone before.
Last week, Dynamite averaged 855,000 viewers. The figure of 857K for NXT would not only beat that, but it cleanly surpasses this week’s too. So now, the perception battle may have just swung in the other direction.
AEW’s response to this will prove to be interesting. They’ve been a company strongly reliant on fan service and pleasing everybody. Last night’s broadcast didn’t go without errors. There were audio problems, and founder Tony Khan addressed those and bought an overrun. It turns out that decision proved pivotal because without it, they might not have gotten to the peak viewership that they did.
WWE recently saw a low point for ratings themselves too. Monday Night Raw recorded record-low viewership, but WWE doesn’t have to necessarily worry about a perception issue during the fall. Everybody, by now, knows that Monday Night Football will often drive a portion of the audience away. That being said, WWE did bounce back this week with a number around 1.5 million, which prior to the fall, was their previous low point of the year. Raw had a strong show this past week as well, so their counter-punch has been effective as has a strong run on NXT and on Smackdown lately as well.
AEW has already announced much of their card for next week. They haven’t proven to be a company that likes to change things unless their hand is forced. Well, in some ways, you can argue their hand was forced now. But for once, it wasn’t because of AEW’s own doings or because of their roster. WWE has their big dogs coming down to Florida next Tuesday. The No. 1 promotion is flexing its muscles a little bit for the camera right now while it tries to butter up for new media rights deals. AEW is at a crucial point for that as well, with their deal expiring soon.
So in terms of responses to these ‘ratings defeats? that AEW can pull off? It’ll be interesting to see what they can pull off. They don’t like to change a whole lot with what they say they’re offering. One of the few trump cards out there for AEW is Mercedes Moné. The heralded women’s mega-star no longer wrestles in North America, but she’s been rumored with and linked to the company for a while. AEW Women’s Champion Saraya is wrestling Hikaru Shida on Tuesday night, and Saraya is expected to win.
But a program with those two, meaning Saraya and Moné, in 2023? It might be a hard sell for a few reasons. Still, you wonder if any sense of desperation will make things change there and whether the dog will stop chasing its tail. She has a massive following and is probably one of the few people ‘out there’ right now who could move a needle. For AEW, a boost in the ratings would be great for them.
But women’s wrestling in AEW is vastly different from its peer in WWE. NXT featured four women’s matches this week alone, and it’s been hard to find more than one women’s wrestling match on Dynamite on a weekly basis, dating all the way back to its premiere four years ago. So the philosophy behind bringing a major women’s star to a promotion that lacks the get-behind for the women compared to WWE may conflict with how the company has run over the last four years.
If not? AEW faces the reality that Dynamite might get passed by NXT, WWE’s third-most popular show, three weeks in a row, including head-to-head next Tuesday. This wasn’t the best week for things to fall out of their favor, and now with Tuesday looming, AEW and the perception battle – and their newfound ratings battle – wage on.
[Data cited by Wrestlenomics Patreon]
