AEW Dynamite Viewership Slightly Dips, Ratings Steady for New Year’s Smash Show

– Wrestlenomics’ Brandon Thurston has the overnight ratings for last night’s New Year’s Smash edition of AEW Dynamite. This was not only the final edition of AEW Dynamite of 2021, but the last one on TNT, as the show will be moving to TBS starting next week.

While last week’s Holiday Bash in Greensboro managed to give Dynamite its first show to draw over a million viewers since early October, last night’s show wasn’t quite able to reach that mark again. Instead, the New Year’s Smash episode fell just below 1,000,000 viewers with an average audience of 975,000 viewers. The number dipped slightly from last week’s audience, which drew 1.020 million viewers.

Ratings in the P18-49 key demo held fairly steady, with last night’s live TNT broadcast drawing a 0.37 rating, or 485,000 viewers. That’s almost identical to last week. But the key demo viewership was actually 1% higher, as last week’s show had 480,000 viewers in the key demo. This was Dynamite’s best key demo viewership since Oct. 27.

Per Showbuzz Daily, AEW Dynamite ranked No. 4 for cable originals on Wednesday night, falling the NCAA Bowl Game programming on ESPN, which took up the top three slots. AEW fell slightly from its No. 3 slot in the rankings for last week.

The Oregon vs. Oklahoma Bowl Game topped the ratings for Wednesday night with a 1.14 rating in the key demo. The Clemson vs. Iowa State Bowl Game topped the viewership for the evening with 4.902 million viewers.

Next week, AEW Dynamite moves to its new home on TBS on Wednesday, January 5. The show is being held at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey. AEW will still be on TNT next week with the first Battle of the Belts special, which is slated for January 8. This will be the first of four planned quarterly TV specials for AEW on TNT in the new year.

Meanwhile, AEW Rampage will remain in its current timeslot on Friday nights on TNT.

AEW Dynamite last night on TNT:

975,000 total viewers
P18-49 rating: 0.37 (about 480,000 viewers)

📊 https://t.co/1SscdBCpr8 pic.twitter.com/joZnEWWjoq

— Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) December 30, 2021

Actual count on P18-49 is 485,000, so slightly higher (+1%) than last week. So by a slim margin, Dynamite's highest in the demo since October 27. Down 4% in P2+.

Dynamite ranked #4 in the demo among cable originals for the day, according to Showbuzz Daily. No broadcast data.

— Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) December 30, 2021