Per Wrestlenomics, SmackDown was watched by 1,175,000 total viewers and did a .28 rating in the 18-49 year old demographic. The show was live after two weeks of pre-tapes, and expanded back to three-hours after spending the last five or so months as a two-hour program. It improved slightly over the previous Friday’s shorter, pre-taped episode in both metrics.
SmackDown was #1 among all original cable programming on the night… a night Programming Insider AGAIN called “lackluster” (get a Thesaurus,
Programming Insider). The only higher-rated show on broadcast was FOX’s coverage of the Holiday Bowl. It finished first overall with a .29 demo rating from 2.39 million viewers.
It’ll be difficult to fill every three-hour Friday with as much news and excitement as they did on Jan. 2. We hope they try though, and not just because it would be good for ratings — which we track each week, updating our list of SmackDown results from the past year:
- Jan. 3, 2025* – 1.53 million viewers / .45 demo rating
- Jan. 10 – 1.44 / .40
- Jan. 17 – 1.40 / . 42
- Jan. 24 – 1.44 / .44
- Jan. 31 – 1.58 / .51
- Feb. 7 – 1.51 / .48
- Feb. 14 – 1.38 / .42
- Feb. 21 – 1.74 / .51
- Feb. 28 – 1.73 / .52
- March 7 – 1.74 / .52
- March 14 – 1.57 / .52
- March 21 – 1.46 / .39
- March 28 – 1.35 / .40
- April 4 – 1.58 / .47
- April 11 – 1.55 / .45
- April 18 – 1.74 / .55
- April 25 – 1.60 / .51
- May 2 – 1.41 / .37
- May 9 – 1.46 / .41
- May 16 – 1.29 / .36
- May 23 – 1.38 / .33
- May 30 – 1.38 / .34
- June 6 – 1.42 / .42
- June 13 – 1.40 / .38
- June 20 – 1.52 / .38
- June 27 – 1.45 / .41
- July 4** – 1.17 / .32
- July 11 – 1.40 / .37
- July 18 – 1.55 / .45
- July 25 – 1.71 / .48
- Aug. 1 – 1.54 / .46
- Aug. 8 – 1.56 / .48
- Aug. 15 – 1.43 / .35
- Aug. 22 – 1.26 / .35
- Aug. 29 – 1.15 / .28
- Sept. 5 – 1.59 / .51
- Sept. 12 – 1.32 / .37
- Sept. 19 – 1.34 / .37
- Sept. 26 – 1.24 / .35
- Oct. 3º – 1.03 / .23
- Oct. 10 – 1.03 / .22
- Oct. 17 – 1.18 / .28
- Oct. 24 – 1.15 / .29
- Oct. 31 – 993K / .20
- Nov. 7 – 1.14 million / .26
- Nov. 14 – 1.16 / .27
- Nov. 21 – 1.21 / .29
- Nov. 28 – 1.14 / .28
- Dec. 5 – 1.06 / .24
- Dec. 12 – 1.24 / .26
- Dec. 19 – 995K / .21
- Dec. 26 – 1.14 million / .27
- Jan. 2, 2026† – 1.18 / .28
* Added a third hour
** Returned to two hours
† Returned to three hours
º Nielsen began using their Big Data + Panel calculation
For complete results from the latest SmackDown, our live blog is here. To read a recap & review of the night’s events click here.
