Friday Night SmackDown was the top show on television on Friday with its largest viewership since September.
The December 9th edition of the show from Pittsburgh averaged 2,306,000 viewers and approximately 739,000 viewers in the 18-49 demographic on Fox, per Brandon Thurston of Wrestlenomics and Showbuzz Daily.
Since last week’s show aired on FS 1, we’ll compare it with the November 25th edition of the show where viewership increased by 6.5% and the 18-49 audience was up by 5% this week.
It was SmackDown’s largest audience since September 23rd, which was the week when the Bray Wyatt tease spiked the audience.
In the key demo, female viewership was up by 19% while males dropped 2% compared with two weeks ago.
The show did see a slide among adults 18-34, which fell 16% and was all due to a male viewership decline in the demo leading to its lowest mark in the demo since October 21st.
Adults 35-49 grew by 18%.
The show ranked first among all television programming on Friday including the NBA on ESPN.
SmackDown was promoted around Kurt Angle’s 54th birthday celebration with the WWE Hall of Famer appearing on the show in his hometown of Pittsburgh.
In Canada, SmackDown averaged 174,000 viewers and 86,000 in the 25-54 demographic on Sportsnet 360 and was its largest audience in Canada since October 28th. The show did not rank among the top ten sports programs that night.
AEW Rampage rebounded from last week’s all-time low audience among 18-49 and returned to the top fifty cable programs on Friday.
The taped show on December 9th averaged 457,000 viewers and approximately 149,000 (0.11) in the key demo, according to Wrestlenomics and Showbuzz Daily.
Overall viewership was up by 2% and the 18-49 increased by 48% this week from last week’s low figures.
The female audience rebounded across the board with major increases in 18-49, 18-34, and 35-49, which all improved 150% from last week’s numbers.
Rampage aired against the end of the L.A. Lakers vs. Philadelphia 76ers game and the start of the Milwaukee Bucks vs. Dallas Mavericks on ESPN, which were the top two cable programs that night.
AEW put Jon Moxley on the show with the former champion opening the program with a match against Konosuke Takeshita and headlined the card with an All-Atlantic Championship match between Orange Cassidy and a mystery opponent, who was revealed to be Trent Seven.
This was Rampage’s largest viewership since October 21st and the highest 18-49 audience in three weeks.
