There are offsetting factors when it comes to moving from the USA Network to CW. USA is a high profile cable network. CW has greater reach because it’s on broadcast. Presumably the roughly 18 million households that use over-the-air antennas and don’t have cable, will have new live access to NXT. Those households will be mostly incremental to the just under 70 million homes that USA Network reaches. But on the other hand, CW is a lower profile channel that struggles to deliver ratings comparable with the higher-performing cable networks.
Based on the viewership that’s normally delivered on CW, it would be surprising if NXT isn’t immediately one of the most-viewed programs on CW when it debuts on the network on Tuesday.
Heavily-promoted wrestling premieres in recent years have often been the most-watched telecasts in a show’s history on a given network—think Smackdown’s debut on Fox, seemingly its recent return to USA, or Dynamite and Collision on TNT. A similar phenomenon can be expected for NXT’s first episode on CW. Once ratings stabilize, if NXT maintains anything close to its USA numbers, it will be one of the most-watched shows on CW.
From July to September, NXT averaged a 0.18 rating in the P18-49 demographic and 624,000 total viewers on USA. A P18-49 rating in that range would easily be CW’s highest year-to-date, and NXT’s total viewership would also rank among the network’s top performers, well above average.
Several weeks into its CW run, NXT’s ratings could reveal a lot about the network’s drawing power and how willing wrestling fans, specifically NXT viewers, are to follow the show to a network they may not typically watch.
The following data was compiled from sources including Showbuzz Daily, SpoilerTV, and Programming Insider. Data for weekdays mainly consists of telecasts airing in primetime.
Average P18-49 ratings on CW, by year and weekday, as of Sept. 26, 2024.
Highest P18-49 ratings on CW, by year and weekday, as of Sept. 26, 2024.
Average total viewership (P2+), in thousands on CW, by year and weekday, as of Sept. 26, 2024.
Highest total viewership (P2+), in thousands on CW, by year and weekday, as of Sept. 26, 2024.
Sorted by P18-49 rating: Top 10 most-viewed telecasts on CW in 2024 year-to-date
Sorted by total viewership (P2+), in thousands: Top 10 most-viewed telecasts on CW in 2024 year-to-date
Brandon Thurston has written about wrestling business since 2015. He operates and owns Wrestlenomics.