Christmas Day Smackdown Live Viewership Drops Big, Yet Still Crushes WWE RAW

As previously reported, this week’s Christmas Eve edition of WWE RAW drew the lowest score of 2018 (and of the entire modern era) with a disappointment, although not altogether surprising 1,775,000 viewers.

We can now confirm that Tuesday night’s Christmas Day edition of Smackdown Live won the Yuletide battle against its red brand counterpart. The show featured Rusev defeating Shinsuke Nakamura to win the United States Championship in a match that most fans knew about nearly a week in advance.

While Smackdown Live still dropped 14% week-over-week, this Tuesday’s show still generated 1,904,000 viewers, nearly 7% more than WWE RAW drew the night before.

Last year Smackdown actually gained viewership airing the day after Christmas, and got even stronger for the post-New Year’s episode, which is not expected to be the case this time around.