Final WWE Network Subscriber Count For 2018, WWE Developing "Next Iteration" Of The Network
The WWE Network had 1.526 million paid subscribers at the end of 2018 with 35,000 free subs for a total of 1.563 million subscribers. The total number of subscribers was only up 1% from 2017, however there were a lot more free subscribers that year. Total paid subscribers were up 4% from 2017.
Of the 1.563 million total subscribers, 1.142 million were in the U.S. with the rest being international. Total paid subscribers were 1.116 million U.S. and 412,000 being international.
The average number of paid subscribers in the fourth quarter of 2018 was 1.585 million, up 7% from 1.484 million in 2017. The average number of paid domestic subscribers in the quarter was 1.116 million. For the year, the average number of paid subscribers was 1.65 million, up 8% from the year prior.
WWE Network revenues rose to $46.8 million in Q4 from $44.9 million in the same quarter the prior year. Overall, Network revenue was $199.3 million in 2018, a 4.6% increase from $190.6 million in 2017.
"WWE Network, pay-per-views and international specials remained significant drivers of viewer engagement," WWE reported. "Among the network's most viewed programs were its international pay-per-view events, Super Show-Down and Crown Jewel, its first all-women's pay-per-view, Evolution, as well as NXT Takeover: WarGames II, and the newly launched weekly series, NXT UK. The Company added more than 100 hours of original content to WWE Network's featured programming and nearly 450 hours of archival content, which resulted in an on-demand library of approximately 11,500 hours at quarter-end."
For this quarter, WWE projects average paid subscribers to be approximately 1.59 million. The company reported that they will also be "developing the next iteration of the WWE Network service," teasing the rumored tiered version of the Network.