Tony Khan comments on Friday’s AEW/WWE ratings

Oct 19, 2021 - by Staff

AEW President, CEO, General Manager & Head Of Creative Tony Khan took to Twitter this evening to react to the ratings for Friday’s AEW Rampage and WWE Supersized SmackDown episodes.

As noted, Friday’s WWE Supersized SmackDown on FS1 drew 866,000 viewers with a 0.24 rating in the 18-49 demographic. The show drew 314,000 18-49 viewers. Friday’s AEW Rampage on TNT drew 578,000 viewers with a 0.24 rating in the 18-49 demo. Rampage drew 313,000 18-49 viewers. Rampage did defeat SmackDown in one demographic on Friday night, and also topped SmackDown head-to-head in the 30-minute overlap in the 18-49 key demographic. You can click here for our original ratings report on both shows, and click here for the demo breakdowns for Rampage and SmackDown.

Khan spent last week tweeting and doing media interviews to hype up Friday’s Rampage, and was largely responsible for fueling the mini-war between WWE SmackDown and AEW Rampage this past Friday night. Shortly after the viewership and key demo numbers dropped earlier this evening, Khan took to Twitter and rallied his fans.

“Let’s go @AEW fans! I’m excited to see head-to-head half hour numbers from last Friday, soon we’ll know. Most of all, I’m looking forward to another great weekend of wrestling this weekend! See you for #AEWRampage Friday + #AEWDynamite one more Saturday before back to Wednesdays!”

Khan then responded to a tweet from Pro Wrestling Torch, that noted how Rampage drew 578,000 viewers, up from 502,000 the week before, to SmackDown’s 866,000. The tweet also noted how AEW and WWE tied with a 0.24 rating in the key 18-49 demo, and with a 0.20 rating in the M18-34 demo. The tweet also pointed to how AEW beat WWE in the M18-49 demo 0.34 to 0.32.

Khan responded, “I’m only estimating but this suggests to me that we probably did pretty well in the yet-to-be-released head-to-head ratings from 10pm-10:30pm, a fight that I didn’t ask for or start, but one for which I was more than willing to show up and in which I was thrilled to participate.”

Khan then replied to a tweet from Bryan Alvarez of the Wrestling Observer, noting the viewership and tied key demo ratings. He wrote, “Wait ‘til we get the head-to-head 10pm-10:30pm numbers and THEN check the replies to this, Bryan.”

Once the news dropped on Rampage beating SmackDown in the 30-minute overlap on Friday night, with 328,000 key demo viewers to 285,000, Khan responded and rallied his fans and employees once again.

“LET’S GO @AEW FANS, WRESTLERS, STAFF! EVERYONE, LFG #AEW!!!!,” he wrote.

Khan made another reply to the tweet on Rampage winning the 30-minute overlap, by simply linking to the October 8 tweet to remind fans what he said about WWE adding the commercial-free 30 minutes to SmackDown.

The linked tweet from October 8 said, “I saw you’re doing a half hour head-to-head with us. I can’t wait to finally beat your main show head-to-head. It’s been a long time coming. See you next Friday for #AEWRampage on @AEWonTNT!”

Khan wasn’t done yet as he responded to a Saturday morning tweet from sports business reporter Darren Rovell, who commented on how WWE scored a “big victory” based on the fast nationals that were released on Saturday.

“WWE got a big victory last night over AEW, even after SmackDown got moved to FS1 because of the MLB Playoffs. SmackDown: 793K Viewers Rampage: 549K Viewers,” Rovell wrote on Saturday.

Khan responded to that tweet this evening and wrote, “Here’s a story nobody leaked to you over the weekend but I’ll give you rn, dog: @AEW got a big victory over WWE after WWE aggressively extended their Friday show 30 minutes & loaded it up head-to-head 10-10:30pm vs #AEWRampage, with AEW Rampage winning 328k to 285k (+15% margin).”

AEW and WWE will go head-to-head once again on Friday, October 29 as SmackDown returns to FS1 due to MLB on FOX coverage. A one-hour episode of Talking Smack is currently scheduled to air up against Rampage that night, but both shows will take a hit due to coverage of the MLB World Series.

Stay tuned for more. You can see Khan’s full tweets below:

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