The first round of the “Wednesday Night Wrestling Wars” goes to All Elite Wrestling. The new wrestling promotion debuted last night on TNT and bested WWE’s NXT head to head in the ratings. AEW also trended higher than NXT on Twitter throughout the night.
Overall, AEW on TNT delivered 1.409 million total viewers, more than half a million more than WWE NXT on USA Network which generated 891,000 total viewers according to The Wrap. In the key demographic of adults 18-49, AEW’s ‘Dynamite’ doubled up NXT by reeling in 878,000 viewers compared to NXT’s 414,000.
In a statement issued to The Wrap, WWE congratulated their new competitor on their first ratings victory.
“Congratulations to AEW on a successful premiere. The real winners of last night’s head-to-head telecasts of NXT on USA Network and AEW on TNT are the fans, who can expect Wednesday nights to be a competitive and wild ride as this is a marathon, not a one-night sprint.”
Both programs ranked in the top 10 for Wednesday night shows on cable in the adults 18-49 demographic. By comparison, WWE’s “Monday Night Raw” delivered 2.57 million viewers over three hours in Live+Same Day so there’s room still for AEW and WWE NXT to attract more viewers.
“This is a league that at its core is created by wrestlers for wrestling fans and I am incredibly energized by the enthusiastic embrace the fans have given to the AEW talent and experience,” said Kevin Reilly, president, TNT, TBS, and truTV, and chief content officer, HBO Max. “AEW won the night with a high quality, incredibly engaging, sports-centric show that will continue with a seamless partnership between AEW and TNT.”
During the 1990’s and 2000’s, wrestling fans became accustomed to tuning in on Monday nights to WWE and WCW and following their battle for ratings supremacy. Fans are hoping that the new Wednesday night wars will produce similar excitement even if the numbers don’t match what USA and TNT earned years ago.
For AEW to start off with a ratings win against a brand as powerful as the WWE is a huge win for Tony Khan, Cody Rhodes, Brandi Rhodes, Nick and Matt Jackson, Kenny Omega, Adam Page and Chris Jericho who took the huge leap to launch the new company. Though it’s just one win, if the first impression from both brands is what fans get treated to regularly on Wednesday night’s, both wrestling groups and television networks will be more than satisfied.
