WWE’s 3rd Biggest TV Audience, South Africa, to See Big Drop in Viewers

WWE recently announced a TV deal with “SuperSport” in Africa to televise Raw and SmackDown live in more than 50 countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

However, Dave Meltzer is reporting that one of WWE’s biggest TV markets, South Africa, is going to take a big hit in viewers as a result of this deal. South Africa was WWE’s third largest TV audience, behind the US and India and usually did about 2 million viewers per week for Raw and SmackDown (which were edited down to an hour, however). In a country of 44 million people, that is a pretty huge amount of viewers.

Unfortunately for many South African fans, the channel that WWE will be moving to is a pay channel, and some reports are that it could easily lead to a drop of 80% of viewers in South Africa.

However, WWE will now have exposure in several other African countries, with millions of potential new viewers. The shows will also now air live and presumably in full.