WWE SmackDown Expected to Return to Two-Hour Format

WWE SmackDown is not expected to remain a three-hour show in the long term.

During a recent appearance on The Pat McAfee Show, WWE Chief Content Officer Paul “Triple H” Levesque confirmed that the program will eventually revert to its traditional two-hour runtime.

“For right now (it’s three hours), and then it switches back to two,” Levesque stated.

Our own Bryan Alvarez adds that discussions within WWE suggest SmackDown may transition back to two hours as early as June 2025.

Levesque has addressed WWE show runtimes in multiple interviews, including a recent conversation on the SI Media Podcast. He explained that the ideal runtime for a wrestling show is somewhere between two and three hours.

“Sometimes you get into the two-hour show, and you just don’t have the real estate on that program to get everything in there you want to get in and all the stories that you want to get in and all the characters that you want to get in and there are people that are getting left off,” Levesque said. “Sometimes three hours can feel long; sometimes two hours is not enough. Somewhere in the middle to me is the sweet spot.”

Meanwhile, Alvarez notes that tonight’s episode of WWE Raw is expected to run for approximately three hours and twenty minutes.

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