More on AEW vs. NXT Week 74 Viewership

The March 3rd episodes of AEW Dynamite and WWE NXT saw AEW generate their highest overall viewership of 2021 so far while NXT generated their second highest key demographic rating of the year so far. AEW continued their advantage over NXT in regards to key demographic viewership. This week’s AEW show was notable for being a “The Crossroads” themed episode.

AEW drew 934,000 viewers and a #6 ranking in the 18-49 demographic while NXT drew 692,000 and a #19 ranking in the 18-49 demographic.

Dave Meltzer reported in this week’s Wrestling Observer Newsletter that while AEW managed to generate their highest overall viewership of the year so far because of Shaquille O’Neal’s appearance, their gains were not from their key demographic viewers but instead mainly from their older viewers. Meltzer reported that the minute-to-minute viewership for AEW’s show revealed that many viewers were not expecting Shaq’s tag team match to open the show and the people who tuned in to only watch Shaq quickly left afterwards. Meltzer also reported that AEW’s show skewed much older than usual while the opposite was the case for NXT’s show this week.

In terms of key demographic viewership, AEW had 425,000 viewers while NXT had 259,000 viewers. AEW’s sole gain was with their Males 18-34 group at 33.3% while their biggest decline was their Females 18-34 and Females 35-49 groups at 28% lower each compared to last week’s show. All four of NXT’s key demographic groups were up with the biggest increase being their Males 18-34 group at 31.8% higher than last week’s show. NXT reportedly beat AEW in the Females 35-49 group while AEW gained a rare win in the Over 50 group against NXT this week.

In terms of the main event quarter, AEW reportedly had 853,000 for overall viewership and 397,000 for key demographic viewership. NXT reportedly had 597,000 for overall viewership and 245,000 for key demographic viewership.

In terms of the one million viewership mark, AEW’s first quarter averaged over 1.1 million viewers and peaked at 1.3 million viewers during the Shaq & Jade Cargill vs. Cody Rhodes & Red Velvet tag team match. AEW also averaged over one million viewers for the MJF & Chris Jericho press conference segment with the Young Bucks. NXT’s first minutes reportedly topped over 1 million viewers due to their strong lead-in program on USA Network.

In terms of yearly comparisons, AEW was up 3.1% in overall viewership but down 5.7% in key demographic viewership compared to the same week last year. NXT was down 3.6% in overall viewership and down 21.7% in key demographic viewership compared to the same week last year.

AEW Dynamite started off with around 1,133,000 viewers and their biggest gain of the night was the Hangman Adam Page & John Silver vs. Matt Hardy & Marq Quen match which gained 17,000 viewers. AEW’s biggest decline of the night was the ending of the Shaq & Cargill vs. Rhodes & Red Velvet match, the Shaq ambulance segment, and the PAC & Rey Fenix vs. D3 & John Skyler match which lost 158,000 viewers.

WWE NXT started off with around 713,000 viewers and their biggest gain of the night was the Toni Storm vs. Io Shirai hype video and the bulk of the WWE Women’s Tag Team Championship match which gained 42,000 viewers. NXT’s biggest decline of the night was the LA Knight promo segment and the Bronson Reed vs. Cameron Grimes match which lost 104,000 viewers.