General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20269 min read

WWE NXT Level Up

NXT Level Up was a weekly professional wrestling streaming series produced by WWE that showcased young and lower-card talent from the NXT brand in exclusive matches. It aired from February 18, 2022, to December 27, 2024, on Peacock in the United States and WWE Network internationally, occupying the Friday-night slot previously held by 205 Live.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Run	February 18, 2022 to December 27, 2024; three seasons¹
Episode count	A 150-episode run per Wrestling Observer/F4W and TVmaze; one reference lists 211 episodes³^•⁴^•¹
Format	About 28 minutes of matches taped before or after NXT episodes at the WWE Performance Center in Orlando, Florida⁵^•¹
Broadcast slot	Fridays at 10 p.m. ET on Peacock and WWE Network; moved to 10:40 p.m. ET in September 2024¹
First episode	Edris Enofé defeated Kushida in the main event¹
Broadcast team	Commentary by Blake Howard and Byron Saxton; Sarah Schreiber as ring announcer¹
End of run	Final episode December 27, 2024; its role taken over by WWE LFG and WWE Evolve¹

Spoilers

Plot

The run (February 2022 – December 2024)

The premiere, taped at the WWE Performance Center in Orlando with Sudu Shah and Nigel McGuinness on commentary, opened with the first match in the show's history: the hulking Harland squashed Javier Bernal in under two minutes, finishing him with a delayed belly-to-back suplex at 1:55. Later in the episode, Tatum Paxley and Ivy Nile won a tag match by submission at 4:18.¹⁸

In the main event, rookie Edris Enofé did the thing the whole show existed to make possible: he beat a veteran. Kushida, a decorated former champion, was down face-first on the mat when Enofé soared through the NXT Arena with a Shooting Star Press and stole the win in an upset. Kushida then hugged him and appeared to offer words of encouragement, a passing-of-the-torch moment that set the tone for everything Level Up would be.¹⁹ Reviewers noticed the crowd was heavily into the action, giving the debut a genuine atmosphere, and Nerdly rated it 3 out of 5 while praising the fresh faces taking center stage, including Paxley making her debut.¹⁰

From there the show settled into its rhythm: three or four short matches a week, nearly all featuring wrestlers WWE was grooming for the future. Some found their footing fast. Ivy Nile, the Pitbull of Diamond Mine, became the most successful Superstar in the show's brief history, running her record to 8-0 by August 19, 2022, when she fought out of a suplex attempt and locked Arianna Grace in the Dragon Sleeper for a quick tapout. The same episode saw Axiom defeat Quinn with his Gold Ratio kick.²⁰

If one wrestler was the soul of the show, it was Dante Chen, who appeared on the third episode against Javier Bernal and kept coming back, eventually wrestling 43 Level Up matches, more than anyone else. The alumni list grew into a roll call of NXT's next generation: Lola Vice, Keilani Jordan, Oba Femi, Je'Von Evans, Myles Borne, Tavion Heights, Thea Hail, and Chen himself all passed through on their way up.²¹

The final episode aired December 27, 2024, taped at the Capitol Wrestling Center with Blake Howard and Byron Saxton on commentary. Carlee Bright, Kendal Grey, and Layla Diggs won a six-woman tag match by pin at 5:35, and in the gauntlet match that followed, Chen outlasted Keanu Carver, Harlem Lewis, and Kale Dixon, pinning Dixon at 7:25 with his Gentle Touch finisher. A closing video package celebrated the alumni who had come through, and the show went out the way it came in: a rookie getting the win.²¹

Characters

Because Level Up was a wrestling showcase rather than a scripted series, its cast was a revolving door of developmental talent. The constants worth knowing:

Dante Chen (Singapore-born WWE developmental wrestler) was the show's iron man, with 43 matches, the most of anyone, from the third episode to the main event of the last.
Edris Enofé (WWE performance signee) won the premiere's main event with a Shooting Star Press over Kushida and became one of the show's early standouts.
Ivy Nile (Emily Andzelm) was the Diamond Mine mat wrestler who went 8-0 on the brand, its most dominant competitor in 2022.
Kushida (Yujiro Kushida), the veteran Japanese junior heavyweight, served as the measuring stick in episode one and put over the rookie.
Blake Howard and Byron Saxton handled commentary in the show's later era, after Sudu Shah and Nigel McGuinness called the first episodes.

Interpretations and controversies

There were no controversies, only the perennial debate about what shows like this are for. Reviewers argued Level Up was as developmental as it gets, even more so than AEW's Dark, because many of its wrestlers had barely wrestled before, performing in front of a live audience, in most cases, for the first time and learning on the fly.²² When WWE quietly ended the show in December 2024, fans read it as the end of NXT's third-broadcast era, with the brand's developmental content folded back into its main programming.

Sequels, spin-offs, and adaptations

NXT Level Up replaced 205 Live, the long-running cruiserweight showcase that occupied the same post-NXT slot, and it in turn gave way to NXT's evolving programming. Its alumni are its legacy: Oba Femi, Je'Von Evans, Lola Vice, and Thea Hail all graduated from Level Up to prominent roles on NXT television.²¹

Purpose and format

The show served as a stepping stone within WWE's developmental system. It featured NXT's younger and lower-card wrestlers, giving performers who were not yet regulars on NXT television a place to gain in-ring experience and build momentum on a professional television production.¹^•⁶ Matches were taped at the WWE Performance Center in Orlando, either before or after the preceding episode of NXT, and episodes were uploaded every Friday at 10 p.m. Eastern Time.¹

WWE positioned the series as a showcase for "the WWE Superstars of tomorrow," with young talent taking their first steps toward the main roster in exclusive matches.⁷ The show consisted mainly of matches rather than continuing storylines, though some storylines did play out on it, and wrestlers were often booked on Level Up before moving up to NXT proper.⁸

Premiere and early run

WWE filed to trademark the NXT: Level Up name on February 9, 2022, and the series debuted on February 18, 2022, immediately after SmackDown, replacing 205 Live, a cruiserweight-focused show that had run on the WWE Network since November 29, 2016.⁹^•² The debut card advertised Edris Enofé versus Kushida in the main event, Javier Bernal versus Harland, and a tag match pitting Fallon Henley and Kayla Inlay against Ivy Nile and Tatum Paxley.² In the historic first match, Harland defeated Javier Bernal, with Joe Gacy opening the show proclaiming himself an "Agent of Change."¹⁰

The series was created under Vince McMahon and executive produced by Paul "Triple H" Levesque and Lee Fitting.¹ During its run, two clip shows aired on November 24 and December 29, 2023, featuring highlights from earlier episodes.¹

Scheduling changes

The show aired Fridays at 10 p.m. ET for most of its run. In September 2024, after SmackDown LowDown began airing live, NXT Level Up moved to a 10:40 p.m. ET slot.¹ Speculation about the show's future mounted around NXT's move to The CW Network in October 2024, as schedule changes and tapings held outside the Performance Center fueled rumors; a September 2024 report had said WWE had no plans to discontinue the show at that time.¹¹

Cancellation and successors

In December 2024, Fightful Select's Corey Brennan reported that the taping held on December 19, 2024, at the WWE Performance Center would be the last in the show's run; the same taping also included matches for WWE LFG, the company's upcoming reality competition series.¹¹ WWE announced that the December 27 episode would conclude the series, with a card featuring a gauntlet match hosted by Dante Chen against Keanu Carver, Harlem Lewis, and Kale Dixon, and a six-woman tag team match.¹² The finale also included the only Six-Woman Tag Team Match in NXT Level Up history, with Wendy Choo, Lainey Reid, and Kali Armstrong facing Carlee Bright, Kendal Grey, and Layla Diggs.¹³

In the gauntlet's finish, Chen defeated Kale Dixon by pinfall at 7:25 with a roaring chop after a superkick and pump kick.¹³

Two programs took over the show's role of developing talent on camera. The reality series WWE LFG (Legends & Future Greats), featuring in-ring matches and rising talent vying for a WWE contract under mentors including Triple H, Shawn Michaels, Undertaker, and Booker T, was set to premiere on A&E in early 2025.¹⁴ Separately, WWE Evolve, a weekly in-ring developmental program produced by Gabe Sapolsky, launched on March 5, 2025, on Tubi, serving as a show for Performance Center talents before they graduate to main NXT television.¹⁵^•¹⁶

Assessment

Commentators on the series finale described the show as an overall success despite uneven quality during its near three-year run, noting that a number of current stars on both the main and NXT rosters got their start on it, and that it gave young wrestlers a place to hone their skills and showcase their characters on a professional television production.¹³ The show sits in a lineage of WWE's secondary weekly series, listed among past minor shows alongside 205 Live, WWE Superstars, and NXT UK.¹⁷

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Series and fictional screen worlds › Unscripted, reality, and web-native series › Web-native and streaming-original series › Comedy, drama, and general-genre web series › Premiered 2022 to 2026

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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