WWE Raw shifts back to two hours for the rest of 2024 starting on October 7

Some major news dropped on Monday, September 9. WWE announce that starting with the Monday, October 7 edition of WWE Raw through the end of 2024, the show will be two hours long. This is a massive change in programming for the show and will have implications in several different ways.

For more than a decade, WWE Raw has been three hours long. The shift started with the 1,000 episode which aired on July 23, 2012. What initially started as a strength for the show, quickly became one of the biggest complaints. Much of the last decade to nearly decade and a half has been plagued by lackadaisical programming. Even with three hours, creative direction under Vince McMahon was poor and not something that could be fixed with more time. In fact, it seemed like the more time the show was given, the worse things became.

However, shifting back to two hours will create another set of challenges. WWE has a stacked roster of performers, but there are several talented members of the roster who struggle to get time on television. As the show features more wrestling each week, that leaves less time to be divided out among the group. It will be interesting to see how this challenge is tackled and who will get ample time on the show.

Then there are questions about what happens once the show heads to Netflix in January 2025. Will the show go back to three hours? Since Netflix is a streaming platform, will that impact how WWE can make adjustments to the overall programming time? What about the advertising dollars that were tied to that third hour? All of these are intriguing questions that will have to be unpacked in the weeks and months to come.

This development also speaks to how well business is going for WWE. That third hour of television is tied to revenue brought in through advertisements and sponsorships. Getting rid of that third hour also gets rid of the money that time generates. WWE has continued to see record-breaking financial success since the COVID-19 global pandemic, and that trend continues today. As the promotion prepares to transition to Netflix, the company is doing so well that this revenue can be forgone for nearly a whole quarter.

WWE continues to ride a wave of momentum as success piles up on a near-monthly basis. The news to shift back to two hours for the remainder of 2024 caught the industry by surprise and will have ramifications that will be interesting to watch unfold.