Edit: YouTube views in the table below have been corrected, which overcounted YouTube views for Q2 2021 and prior, resulting in negative comparisons for 2021 and 2022.
All Elite Wrestling made splash play after splash play over the past year. It began with CM Punk’s return to pro wrestling and debut with AEW in August. That moment was followed up by the double debuts of Adam Cole and Bryan Danielson at the end of All Out in September. Since then, fan fervor for AEW has been on up the upswing as more talent continue to be brought into AEW.
It’s less likely the company that launched in 2019 will be very profitable until it gets a significant upgrade in U.S. media rights fees, which could be the result of negotiations that happen in the next year or two. But the data shows AEW’s revenues and other key metrics have grown over time.
The metrics measured above are TV ratings, pay-per-view buys, YouTube search and Google web search. It is worth noting the numbers for Friday night program Rampage are not included in the data because the show is not a year old yet.
For AEW Dynamite, the show has seen a 29% growth in overall viewership through the first quarter of 2022. In the P18-49 demo, AEW’s flagship program has experienced a 28% growth through the first quarter of 2022. These numbers coincide with Dynamite’s move from TNT to TBS and having a strong lead-in from The Big Bang Theory. AEW also benefited from full-capacity crowds compared to limited crowds in 2021.
AEW has been running on the model of quarterly pay-per-views throughout its existence. They have added some slight wrinkles with the introduction of TNT specials, and a special pay-per-view co-promoted by AEW and NJPW was announced on April 20.
For AEW’s main four pay-per-views, with the exception of Double or Nothing, every show saw at least 50% growth in pay-per-view buys. All Out 2021 exceeded 200,000 pay-per-views, the most for a U.S. pay-per-view since 1999. In the first quarter of 2022, Revolution did not see the same growth in 2021, but it still was up 17% from 2021.
YouTube views and Google web search are not an exact science, but they do provide a view on how often people are watching content and how often a topic is in the mind of consumers.
YouTube views have grown 8% through the first quarter of 2021, but Q2 and Q3 do not seem to be great quarters for AEW, according to 2021 numbers. While Dynamite has seemed to have found a groove on cable television, it appears there is a lot more room for improvement when it comes to the digital space in places like YouTube.
YouTube data was sourced from Social Blade, which takes a daily count of the public video view count on a channel’s page. That data was adjusted by Wrestlenomics to correct for videos removed or re-added, which influences the view count.
In April, Brandon Thurston tweeted an analysis of worldwide Google web search for “active” wrestling personalities through January and March 2022. The top three of the list featured WWE talent, with Cody Rhodes taking fourth, though Rhodes now is with WWE.
To be clear, WWE is ahead of AEW in all categories discussed here, in some cases by multiples, with the exception of pay-per-view. WWE distributes its pay-per-view equivalent events primarily on streaming services like Peacock.
However, AEW itself has seen sharp growth in Google web search. In worldwide searches, AEW has grown 50% through 2022 Q1, and in the United States, AEW has grown 57% through 2022 Q1. While these numbers are promising, like YouTube, there is room for improvement in the digital space for AEW.
Jason Ounpraseuth has covered pro wrestling since 2019. He co-hosts the Gentlemen’s Wrestling Podcast.
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