UPDATED: AEW Dynamite Drops in Numbers for First Night of Championship Week, Ranks No. 3

UPDATE: Showbuzz Daily has now released the Wednesday Cable Top 150 rankings for this week. AEW Dynamite finished at No. 3 this week behind the NBA Play-In games on ESPN. The game featuring the San Antonio Spurs vs. the New Orleans Pelicans topped the ratings last night with a 0.95 in the key demo.

The NBA Play-In game featuring the Charlotte Hornets vs. the Atlanta Hawks came in second with a 0.80 rating. The Five on FOX News topped cable original TV viewership for Wednesday with 3.596 million viewers.

Dynamite ranked No. 2 last week. So, the good news for AEW is that Dynamite managed to stay in the Top 5 against the NBA Playoffs.

ORIGINAL: Wrestlenomics’ Brandon Thurston has the numbers for last night’s edition of AEW Dynamite. After last week’s slight increases, numbers saw drops in viewership and the key demo this week, despite a very stacked show in New Orleans for the first night of AEW’s “Championship Week.”

Last night’s live TBS broadcast drew an average audience of 977,000 viewers. That’s slightly down from last week’s average viewing audience, which was 989,000 viewers.

Meanwhile, ratings also saw a slight decrease in the P18-49 key demo. AEW Dynamite drew an average 0.37 rating (486,000 viewers), which fell from last week’s 0.38 rating (496,000 viewers). This is the lowest key demo audience for Dynamite since March 2.

Last night’s show featured a stacked card, with CM Punk and Penta Oscuro kicking things off. Jurassic Express successfully defended the AEW Tag Team Championships against reDRagon, and Samoa Joe defeated Minoru Suzuki in the main event to capture the ROH TV Championship. The show ended with an overrun segment, featuring the debut of former basketball player Satnam Singh, who attacked Joe and joined with Sonjay Dutt and Jay Lethal.

This is still a major week for AEW, which has been dubbed Championship Week. AEW Rampage will be airing at an earlier timeslot live on TNT this Friday (April 15) at 7:00 pm EST due to the NBA Play-In Tournament game. Saturday, TNT is set to air the Battle of the Belts II special via tape delay at 8:00 pm EST.

Tomorrow’s live Championship Week edition of Rampage will also feature Hangman Page defending his AEW World Championship against Adam Cole in a Texas Deathmatch.

Rankings for Wednesday cable TV originals from Showbuzz Daily are not yet available.

AEW Dynamite last night on TBS:

977,000 viewers
P18-49: 0.37 (486,000)

Down slightly from recent weeks but lowest demo since Mar 2.

📊 More demos & analysis: https://t.co/1SscdBCpr8 pic.twitter.com/Aq1enk3btK

— Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) April 14, 2022