Back in 2019 the wrestling world changed in a major way when All Elite Wrestling launched. The company provided fans and talent an alternative to WWE and AEW has created its own space in the marketplace.
During a recent WrestleVotes Live Q&A on Fightful Select it was noted that there are people who work for WWE who watch AEW programming and report what’s going on with the company to different departments.
“I know that there’s people in Stamford with AEW action figures on their desks. There’s people’s jobs is to watch AEW programming and report into analytics and different departments on what’s going on in AEW.”
When AEW Dynamite first launched in October of 2019 the show was going head to head with NXT on Wednesday nights. This time period came to be known as the Wednesday Night Wars, but NXT ultimately moved to Tuesday nights in April of 2021.
Even though AEW and NXT no longer go head to head on a weekly basis it’s no big secret that WWE has made efforts to counter program All Elite Wrestling. Back in September of 2025, WWE WrestlePalooza and AEW All Out aired on the same day.
While AEW has given wrestlers more options for employment a number of names have jumped from AEW to WWE in recent years such as Penta, Jade Cargill, Rey Fenix, Royce Keys and Blake Monroe to name a few.