WrestleMania 40 was not just the beginning of a ‘new era’ for WWE. It was a record breaking, story finishing, behemoth of a weekend for the company, producing some jaw dropping numbers as a result.
Chief Content Officer Paul ‘Triple H’ Levesque regularly championed the two night extravaganza as the biggest WrestleMania of all time. But in all honesty, the 14-time World Champion was actually underselling the monstrous success the promotion enjoyed across the last week.
Fans from all 50 US states and 64 different countries helped break WWE’s existing gate record by an eye watering 78%. A staggering 145,298 people attended both nights at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia.
Not only that, but NXT’s Stand and Deliver show, taking place mere hours before the first night of WrestleMania 40, was the developmental brand’s highest attended event of all time. The Shawn Michaels helmed brand drew a crowd of 16,545 to the Wells Fargo Center, which was also the site for a sell out SmackDown and Monday Night Raw (both shattering their previous all-time gate records), all of which contributed to a total cumulative crowd across all weekend events of over 200,000 people.
WrestleMania 40 was not only a gangbusters success at the box office, either. Viewership increased by 41% from WrestleMania 39, meaning this year’s edition of the Grandaddy of ’em All was the most watched ‘Mania in history. It also drew record merchandise sales for WWE too. In partnership with Fanatics, merchandise sales increased over 20% from last year’s WrestleMania in Los Angeles, with new Undisputed WWE Universal Champion Cody Rhodes alone responsible for over $1m of those sales.
The five live shows alone were not the only events that drew humongous numbers, either. WWE World, held across five days at the Pennsylvania Convention Centre in partnership with Fanatics Events, is now the highest-grossing and most-attended fan event in company history.
Oh, and as if all that wasn’t enough, WrestleMania 40 became the most socially viewed WrestleMania of all-time, with over 660 million views consumed over the two days. WWE’s YouTube channel saw its most-viewed day in channel history on the event’s second day, with more than 67 million views in 24 hours. Paul Heyman’s memorably infamous Hall of Fame speech also, typically, broke previous records held for most viewed Hall of Fame content, clocking a ludicrous 27 million views across all social platforms so far.
This is undoubtedly WWE’s most successful, white hot run since the much lauded Attitude Era of the late ’90s and early ’00s. However, with a $5bn Netflix deal set to commence in January 2025, an immensely popular new leading man in ‘American Nightmare’ Cody Rhodes and a roster as wildly stacked as it is popular, this isn’t looking like a run that will slow down any time soon. Three Premium Live events will be coming to Europe over the next four months, with Backlash taking place in Lyon, France later this month, Clash At The Castle taking over Glasgow in June and Bash In Berlin at the end of August.
Now, about that WrestleMania at Wembley Stadium, lads…
WrestleMania 40 is available to stream now only on Peacock and WWE Network
Featured Image Credit: WWE
