WWE Raw Viewership Report Sees Week 2 Dip After Netflix Debut

When the announcement was first made that WWE would be moving "Raw" over to Netflix, there was some prevailing thought that this would be the end of wrestling fans, and pundits, focusing on ratings, given that Netflix viewership weren't covered by Nielsen. Instead, what it was the end of was covering viewership in the traditional sense, with analysis instead going to seven-day viewership, hours viewed, and even minutes viewed.

That was the case for the first and second week for "Raw" on Netflix at least, and in one similarity to when wrestling shows debuted on cable, there was decline in the second week. Wrestlenomics, using Netflix data, reports that "Raw's" second foray on Netflix was watched by 3.7 million viewers over the last seven days. This number was obtained by dividing the total number of hours viewers watched "Raw" by the show's duration.

As a result, "Raw's" numbers were down from the previous week, dropping 37% from the 5.9 million global viewers that watched the Netflix debut over seven days. Though slightly higher, the decline isn't that far from week over week declines past wrestling shows had after their debuts, as "SmackDown's" second week on Fox declined 26% in 2019, while "AEW Dynamite's" second week on TNT declined 28%. "Raw" was ranked 4th on Netflix's top ten shows, the same position it held the week before.

In contrast to the bombast of the Netflix debut, which saw appearances from The Rock, Undertaker, and Hulk Hogan, "Raw's" second week was a more normal edition of the red brand. The show did feature one major occurrence in the debut of former AEW star Penta, who defeated Chad Gable in singles action.