Raw rating compared to Monday Night Football, a bragging point for the Charlotte-Belair viewership, key metrics and perspective

WWE Monday Night Raw last night drew a 1.14 cable household rating, in line with last week’s 1.15 rating. That’s down from the year ago rating of 1.26 in the midst of the ThunderDome era.

The average total viewership for Raw was 1.59 million, a bit down from last week’s 1.582 million. Hourly viewership:

• Hour 1: 1.577 million
• Hour 2: 1.624 million
• Hour 3: 1.577 million

The main event of Charlotte vs. Bianca Belair for the Raw Title led to the third hour drawing equal to the first hour. There has only been one instance where the third hour didn’t draw less than the first hour in the previous 16 months, so that’s a testament to the drawing power of the women, even if the viewership and ratings weren’t any better than last week. In other words, among those who checked out the show in the first hour, just as many stuck around for third hour whereas usually some of those viewers don’t stick around to the third hour.

Monday Night Football on ESPN drew 12.5 million total viewers.

In terms of the key 18-49 demographic that advertisers target and thus most closely track, Raw dropped to a 0.39 rating from a 0.42 last week. The prior five weeks head-to-head with NFL Monday Night Football averaged 0.47. They also faced competition from the Major League Baseball playoffs last night.

Raw’s three hours finished in positions 7, 8, and 9 among all cable shows in the 18-49 demo. Only NFL and MLB programs finished ahead of it. The football game drew a 4.06 demo rating, more than ten times Raw’s demo rating.

The male demographics were also down slightly. In the 18-49 male demo they drew 0.48, down slightly from 0.50. In the 18-34 male demo, it drew a 0.24, in line with last week’s 0.25.