WWE Quarter-Hour TV Ratings – Raw vs. Smackdown Week 1 – Top Segments for each show, Raw coasts to victory

WWE Brand Battle Quarter-Hour Report
Week 1 – July 25/26

WWE Smackdown Live has an uphill battle to get close to Raw in the Brand Battle.

In Week 1 of WWE’s intra-brand competition, Raw defeated Smackdown by a margin of 18-25 percent across all TV metrics – Ratings, Viewership, and key demos.

Within the key demos is the bellwether males 18-49 demo. Raw topped Smackdown by 25 percent with a 1.54 rating versus 1.15 rating for Smackdown.

In the quarter-hour TV ratings, Raw beat Smackdown in each segment of the show. Smackdown’s highest-rated quarter-hour did not come close to Raw’s lowest-rated quarter-hour.

Both shows were consistent throughout, though.

July 25 Raw M18-49 Flow

• First Hour – 1.55 rating / 975,000 viewers avg.
• Second Hour – 1.54 rating / 971,000 viewers avg.
• Third Hour – 1.54 rating / 971,000 viewers avg.
• OVERALL – 1.55 rating / 975,000 viewers avg.

July 26 Smackdown – M18-49 Flow

• First Hour – 1.14 rating / 719,000 viewers avg.
• Second Hour – 1.15 rating / 727,000 viewers avg.
• OVERALL – 1.15 rating / 723,000 viewers avg.

Despite Raw’s overall third hour viewership declining three percent, the m18-49 demo held on at a steady rate.

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July 25 Raw Viewership Flow – M18-49 demo

– Raw started slow out of the gate with none of the first four quarter-hours topping the benchmark 1.0 million viewership mark.

– The second hour picked up with 1.019 million viewers in the fifth quarter-hour and 1.014 million viewers in the sixth quarter-hour.

This was the peak audience of the show – until the over-run – for the second fatal four-way #1 contender match involving Roman Reigns, Chris Jericho, Sami Zayn, and Sheamus.

– After Q5 and Q6, Raw was below 1.0 million the remainder of the show until the over-run.

– The over-run slightly beat Q5 and Q6 with 1.028 million viewers for Finn Balor vs. Roman Reigns in the Universal Title #1 contender match.

– The peak minutes of the show were at 10:16 and 10:17 p.m. at the start of Q10 in the third hour.

This was the finish and post-match of Charlotte vs. Sasha Banks for the Women’s Title. The match built effectively from the middle of Q9 until the finish and post-match in Q10.

July 26 Smackdown Viewership Flow – M18-49 demo

– Whereas Raw started below-average, Smackdown Live started above-average with the introduction of the roster and battle royal to determine a spot in the main event contendership match.

The first hour peaked with a 1.18 m18-49 rating in Q2 for the conclusion of the battle royal.

– The top of the second hour matched Q2 with a 1.18 rating. The first-half of Q5 with Randy Orton on Miz TV outdrew the second-half with Orton’s in-ring return against The Miz.

The middle of the second hour fell off, like the first hour.

– Smackdown then peaked at the end of the show for the main event Six-Pack Challenge for a WWE Title shot against Dean Ambrose at Summerslam.

The Q8 rating was a 1.20, topping 1.18s in Q2 and Q5.

Included was the peak audience of the show with 901,000 viewers at 9:54 p.m. and 879,000 viewers at 9:55 p.m. for the end of the Six-Pack.

After Dolph Ziggler won and folks stood around in the ring waiting for the end of the hour, the audience tuned out by about 100,000 viewers.