AEW's UK TV Ratings Have "Declined Greatly"

Should AEW be concerned by their recent UK TV ratings?

by Andrew Pollard
Tony Khan
AEW

While AEW President Tony Khan will have been hoping that the announcement of All In taking place in London this summer would drive the company's UK TV ratings, that has seemingly not been the case.

In the latest edition of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, Dave Meltzer noted how AEW's ratings on ITV4 in the UK have "declined greatly" since the announcement that the company would be heading to Wembley Stadium for All In.

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As Meltzer detailed:

"It’s actually become amazing about U.K. ratings on ITV4 since the announcement of Wembley. Not only, as noted before, have ratings not gone up since the announcement, but they’ve actually declined greatly. Chris Jericho announced a Fozzy show on 8/25 at the O2 Forum in Kentish Town in London, which is the Friday before All In. Fozzy isn’t touring Europe at the time so this is a one-off to take advantage of the weekend of wrestling events in the city."

For those unaware, ITV4 is the UK home for AEW, with Dynamite airing every Friday at 9pm and Rampage airing every Tuesday, usually around 11pm. Obviously these shows are not live, and instead air several days after the initial live broadcasts in the US, on FITE, and elsewhere on Wednesdays and Fridays, respectively.

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As per Thinkbox (via Backbodydrop.com), the first Dynamite after Tony Khan announced All In saw a 35,000 boost to bring in a rating of 115,000. Somewhat surprisingly, the following Rampage was down 30,000 on its prior week, pulling in 59,000 viewers.

In the time since the All In announcement, Dynamite has flitted between 77,000 and 108,000 viewers, while Rampage has brought in between 55,000 and 94,000.

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For reference, the highest Dynamite rating of 2023 so far was the 31 March episode - taped on 29 March - which drew 155,000 viewers. As for Rampage, the 7 February episode - taped on 3 February - pulled in an impressive 156,000 to be the highest rated of the year so far.

Senior Writer
Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.