Posted in: Impact Wrestling, Sports, TV | Tagged: impact, ratings, wrestling

Impact Breaks Into Top 100 Cable Shows for Kenny Omega Episode

Published Wed, 09 Dec 2020 19:05:32 -0600

Impact Wrestling saw a big rise in viewership this week thanks to a crossover with AEW and the heavily-promoted first appearance of Kenny Omega since winning the AEW Championship from Jon Moxley at AEW's special episode of Dynamite, Winter is Coming, last week. Impact, which broke into the top 150 for the first time in recent memory last week, was ranked #96 this week and saw an increase in viewership of over 50,000 viewers.

The official logo of Impact Wrestling.

Impact Jumps to 96th Place

Last week was a big week for Impact, as the show entered the top 150 cable rankings to land in 121st place with 166,000 viewers and a .05 in the 18-49 demographic. That show took place before anyone had any inkling of what Kenny Omega and Don Callis had in store the next night, so the increase can only be viewed as Impact's hard work at improving the company's produce over many months. But after last week's Winter is Coming, this week's highly-anticipated episode drew 221,000 fans and a .08 in 18-49.

At its peak last night, Impact had over 50,000 viewers watching the live stream of the show on Twitch, though it hovered closer to 40,000 for most o the night. That represented a massive, more than tenfold increase in Impact's usual Twitch numbers. The show also garnered more than 200,000 views on YouTube, trended number two in the United States on Twitter, and was aired on Facebook as well.

The Bottom Line 'Cause Chad Said So

It was good timing for Impact, with the Final Resolution Impact Plus special coming up on Saturday and the company in the middle of a creative boom period. However, fans tuning into the show may have been surprised by the quietness of the broadcast, which has featured no live fans, not even digital or paid staff, since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Of course, that's actually the way The Chadster prefers his wrestling. Kenny Omega's appearance was saved until the end of the show to maximize new viewers' exposure to Impact. The in-ring main event featured a tag team match between the team of Willie Mack and Impact World Champion Rich Swann and the team of Chris Bey and TNA Champion Moose, It will be interesting to see how much of that audience sticks around for next week's show.

Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!