WWE SmackDown overnight ratings get no post-Royal Rumble bump

Image: WWE

Men’s Royal Rumble winner Edge making his third appearance on WWE television this week did not seem to mean anything for SmackDown viewership on Friday night. The episode averaged 2.126 million viewers in the fast nationals, down 4.6 percent from the overnight number for last week’s Royal Rumble go-home show.

SmackDown’s viewership was consistent throughout the show, dropping 1.7 percent from the first to second hour. The episode averaged 2.144 million viewers in hour one and 2.108 million viewers in hour two.

Fox finished last among the major networks in terms of total viewers with NBC’s average of 2.9 million viewers coming closest. SmackDown drew a 0.6 rating in the 18-49 demo, which is the same overnight number it had drawn each of the last three weeks. SmackDown was second among network programming in 18-49, finishing behind ABC’s Shark Tank.

The 18-34 demo was also the same as it’s been with a 0.3 rating. That trailed Shark Tank and was tied for second place on the networks.

All the major networks aired original first-run programming, so that likely was the reason for the lower viewership for SmackDown.

Year-over-year, SmackDown was down 16.5 percent in viewership, down 20 percent in 18-49, and down 33.3 percent in 18-34.

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Here’s a look at the last 10 weeks of overnight viewership for SmackDown (note: the December 18 episode aired on FS1):