The recent transfer of Monday Night Raw from USA Network to Netflix has been a game changer for both the streaming service and the U.S. live sports landscape. One less-publicized aspect of this collaboration is beginning to yield significant benefits for Netflix.
In a recent episode of The Town podcast, Netflix’s chief content officer, Bela Bajaria, noted that the platform is experiencing notably strong WWE viewership internationally. This can likely be attributed to the fact that those users now have nearly all their WWE content consolidated into a single location—Netflix. The landmark deal not only allowed Raw to stream on Netflix for American wrestling fans but also resulted in the closure of the WWE Network worldwide. In many regions—excluding the U.S., where PLEs are available on Peacock and Smackdown airs on Fox—Smackdown and WWE premier live events (PLEs) now also stream on Netflix alongside Raw, including countries like Brazil, Spain, and Thailand. Bajaria highlighted the particularly promising Raw numbers in these regions.
“I think what’s been really great to see is that I’d say the viewing outside of the U.S. is really interesting,” Bajaria stated. “Because we have Royal Rumble, we have all of the other pieces of WWE outside (the U.S.). I think audiences and (subscribers) outside of the U.S. having it all there, in all of those countries, in one place and easy access to watch it, to watch it live, to also watch it (on-demand), it’s just been great.”
When Netflix reports WWE viewership, it indicates the countries where events have reached the Top 10. The latest episode of Raw made the charts in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Bolivia, according to Wrestling News Source. Each of these nations can now access the entire WWE lineup on Netflix. Looking ahead, India is anticipated to migrate its content from platforms like Disney+ Hotstar to Netflix as part of the streamer’s global strategy focused on worldwide events.
