It has been more than a year but NXT failed to impress the USA network with their ratings. Neither their overall viewership nor their 18-49 demo managed to impress the USA network. They have even managed to hit the lowest 400k viewership at one point of the show a few weeks ago.
AEW Dynamite managed to beat them more than 50 times in the ratings. NXT never beat Dynamite in the 18-49 demo. The ratings gap between NXT and dynamite is getting bigger with each week. In most cases AEW beat them by 200k overall viewers.
On normal Wednesdays AEW dynamite is in the top 10 or top 5 in the showbiz daily ratings chart. Hands down Dynamite is the top wrestling show on Wednesday night. On the other hand NXT does not even manage to be in the top 50. The only reason WWE NXT is on Wednesday in the same time slot as a Dynamite is just to take away some viewers from Dynamite.
The main goal of NXT was to make sure that TNT does not renew the TV deal with AEW. taking away as many viewers from Dynamite as possible. But they failed to achieve their goal, TNT extended their TV deal with AEW for three years. This is why there is not much use competing with Dynamite each week. Once again WWE started to treat NXT like a developmental brand, taking away key wrestlers like Keith Lee, Matt Riddle, Rhea Ripley to Raw or SmackDown. Hence with each passing week AEW is beating them more decisively. It is hurting the USA network more than it is hurting WWE. If they could move NXT to another night instead of Wednesday they could get a better rating.
Before NXT moved to the USA network on Wednesdays, people used to see it exclusively on the WWE Network. But after NXT moved to the USA network some people cancelled their WWE subscription, as they could see it now free on TV. So they just lost a bunch of paying customers. Some people kept watching NXT on the WWE network because they are used to it, that is why it is not increasing their TV viewership/ratings, hence they are losing to AEW every week.
NBC sports is going to shut down within 2021 the sports is going to move to the USA network. So having a sport instead of NXT might help grow the ratings. So cancelling NXT to show sports instead in the same time slot might help get a better rating or viewership. As of 2021 the wrestling fans are very limited, so if AEW is getting more viewers then NXT will get less. It might be beneficial for them to cancel WWE NXT as it is hardly making any profit.
Recently WWE sold all of their WWE Network rights to peacock. So taking NXT off of the USA network and then putting it exclusively on peacock might be a better idea. This will boost the peacock WWE subscriptions. Will get more subscribers very quickly. Or they might consider moving NXT to another night other than Wednesday away from AEW Dynamite. So they get better ratings.