Fox Sports Net and Webcasts (2004–2005) On May 5, 2004, TNA sealed a television deal with
Fox Sports Net (FSN) where they would get a one-hour timeslot on Fridays in most markets, putting TNA on unrestricted cable and satellite for the first time. TNA began taping a new weekly series that month,
TNA Impact!, with the
first episode premiering on June 4, 2004. After 51 shows TNA's contract with FSN expired in May 2005 and was not renegotiated, with the last FSN episode of
Impact! airing on May 27, 2005.
Impact! continued to air on certain regional networks in place of
Xplosion. On July 1, TNA began offering new episodes through their website, first using
BitTorrent downloads, then by
streaming through
RealPlayer. To save on production costs, four hours of the show were recorded in a day and made available throughout the subsequent month.
Spike TV (2005–2014) in 2007 Seeking a more profitable television outlet, TNA negotiated a Saturday night timeslot with Spike TV (now known as the
Paramount Network), which had recently lost
WWE Raw back to
USA Network. Spike TV started airing
Impact! on
October 1, 2005, five days after the departure of
Raw. Two episodes were taped every other Tuesday, airing them on the subsequent Saturdays. TNA's syndication contracts for the show on local television channels, from after the FSN contract, were converted to contracts for their syndicated show,
TNA Xplosion. They were no longer paying for the timeslot, though Spike controlled their advertising revenue. Because of viewership growth,
Impact! was moved to Thursdays in April 2006, and later to an earlier primetime slot in November. At this time tapings were moved from Tuesdays to Mondays. In June 2006, episodes became available at the
iTunes Store, though they have since been removed.
Expansion to two hours (2007–2010) Due to further viewership growth,
Impact! was expanded to two hours on October 4, 2007, still starting at the same time of 9:00 p.m. On January 17, 2008, Spike presented an event entitled "
Global Impact!", which featured TNA wrestlers in matches against talents from
New Japan Pro-Wrestling and on March 27, 2008,
Impact! aired live for the first time in the show's history in its regular timeslot. By April 2, 2008, TNA had come to terms on a deal that had the show airing in Australia starting April 5. Up until then, they had only broadcast their monthly pay-per-view events on Main Event in Australia. The contract expired in March 2011 and was not renewed, however, in May 2011, the show was picked up by Australian Network
FuelTV, which began airing it every Saturday at 8:30 p.m. AEST, starting on June 11. On October 23, 2008, TNA aired its first
Impact! filmed outside the Impact Zone in Orlando, Florida. It was broadcast from
The Joint in the
Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in
Las Vegas, Nevada. TNA also made the transition to
HD for this and all future broadcasts.
Move to Mondays (2010) On January 4, 2010, the show went head-to-head for the first time with TNA's rival-promotion
WWE's flagship show
Raw. This would be the first time since March 2001 that two major wrestling promotions went head-to-head in a Monday night television ratings competition. TNA advertised the debut of
Hulk Hogan and his return to professional wrestling, while WWE promoted the return of
Bret Hart to
Raw, who last made an appearance in November 1997 before the
Montreal Screwjob. On this night,
Impact! was watched by around 4 million viewers for the opening hour, but towards the end of the show, the viewership declined to 2.2 million viewers. This was the highest viewership in the show's history.
Raw was watched by 5.6 million viewers, the most since August 2009.
Impact! was permanently moved to Monday nights on March 8, 2010. The show would air live on a bi-weekly basis and be taped for the following week. Beginning with the April 12, 2010, episode,
Impact! was aired at 8:00 p.m. Eastern on Spike TV. This change was made as a result of an increase in ratings from the March 29, 2010, show (which aired at 9:00 p.m. Eastern) to the April 5, 2010, episode, which aired at 8:00 p.m. Eastern. During this period, replays of the show continued to air on Thursday nights. After two months, the show returned to Thursdays permanently as the ratings for the Monday showings were declining. The final Monday
Impact! scored a 0.8 rating.
Return to Thursday Nights (2010–2011) The show returned to Thursday nights on Thursday, May 13, 2010. Commenting on the move on the TNA website, Brian J. Diamond (Spike's Senior Vice President of Sports and Specials) said, "The fans have spoken and with their input, we have determined the best time slot to maximize the TNA audience is on Thursday nights where we are confident it will be among the most-watched shows with young men." TNA president
Dixie Carter called this move "a win/win opportunity for both TNA and the fans". On February 24, 2011, TNA held
Impact! tapings at the
Crown Coliseum in
Fayetteville, North Carolina.
Re-branding to Impact Wrestling (2011–2014) On May 3, 2011, during the tapings of the May 12 episode of
TNA Impact, the show would change its name to
Impact Wrestling and adopt the slogan "Where Wrestling Matters". The show's color scheme would change from red and black to blue, white and gray, while the URL of TNA's website was also changed to impactwrestling.com. TNA held
Impact Wrestling tapings on August 25, 2011 at the
Von Braun Center in
Huntsville, Alabama, on September 21 at the
Knoxville Coliseum in
Knoxville, Tennessee, and on October 26 at the
Macon Coliseum in
Macon, Georgia. The first international
Impact Wrestling tapings took place on January 28, 2012 at the
Wembley Arena in
London,
England. Through the summer of 2012, starting on May 31,
Impact Wrestling aired live at a new time slot at 8:00 p.m. ET. The live schedule was later extended first through September, and then through the rest of 2012. On March 14, 2013, TNA began taping Impact from different venues around the United States, such as the
Sears Center in Chicago, the
Sands Casino Event Center in
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and the
Manhattan Center's Grand Ballroom in
New York City. TNA officially terminated its lease with
Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida in late March 2013 and left the Impact Zone. On March 14, 2013, TNA introduced a new universal HD set which is used for all weekly programming. On May 30, 2013, Impact Wrestling went back to its old start time of 9:00 p.m. In 2013, TNA broadcast five
Impact Wrestling specials, starting on July 18, 2013 with
Destination X. This was followed by
Hardcore Justice,
No Surrender,
Final Resolution and
Turning Point. These specials replaced the PPV events of the same name following TNA changing their monthly PPV format to a quarterly model. On November 21, 2013 TNA returned to Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida due to the high cost of production on the road after being unable to cover the rising costs of taping on the road. Impact tapings were filmed from soundstage 19, rather than at the original Impact Zone at soundstage 21, but select shows were still taped on the road from time to time, such as the
Genesis Impact Wrestling special on January 16 and 23, 2014 from Huntsville, Alabama. TNA also launched a new programming initiative called "IMPACT365" to advertise upcoming shows and start new angles and storylines. On January 30, 2014, for the first time,
Impact Wrestling was broadcast live in the United Kingdom on
Challenge before it aired in the United States. The show took place at
The Hydro in
Glasgow,
Scotland. Starting with the March 13, 2014 live broadcast of
Impact Wrestling, TNA changed to soundstage 20 at Universal Studios. Soundstage 19 and 20 were only temporary venues for Impact Wrestling tapings. Since June 10, 2014 TNA taped Impact Wrestling from The Sands Casino Event Center in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and the Manhattan Center's Grand Ballroom in New York City. On July 17, 2014, after a poll made on the
Impact Wrestling website, TNA brought back the six-sided ring permanently.
Final months on Spike (July–December 2014) On July 28, 2014,
TMZ reported that Spike would not renew TNA's contract, which was due to expire in September. The decision was reportedly triggered by TNA's decision to bring writer
Vince Russo back to the company as a consultant. However, Mike Johnson of PW Insider who first revealed that Russo was working for TNA insists that his involvement had nothing to do with the cancellation. TNA president Dixie Carter and Spike subsequently released independent statements claiming that negotiations were ongoing. In August, amid ongoing negotiations with Spike,
Impact Wrestling moved to Wednesday nights. Spike spokesperson David Schwarz told
The Christian Post that increasing competition from other sports programs prompted the move from Thursday nights. The show ceased airing new televised events after the edition of November 19 of
Impact Wrestling, with the final episodes of 2014 being dedicated to Best of TNA clip shows, before resuming events on January 7, 2015 with a live show from The Manhattan Center's Grand Ballroom in New York City. The last episode of
Impact Wrestling broadcast on Spike aired on December 24, 2014.
Post-Spike TV (2015–2017) On November 19, 2014, TNA reached a deal with
Discovery Communications to move its programming, including
Impact Wrestling, to
Destination America in January 2015. After premiering on Wednesday, January 7,
Impact Wrestling moved to its permanent slot on Fridays on January 16. Along with the move to Destination America, the show got a new logo, graphics package, theme music, and stage. Former WWE employee
Josh Mathews was also added to the commentary team. A brand new weekly series hosted by
Mike Tenay,
Impact Wrestling: Unlocked, premiered on Saturday, January 17 and ''TNA Wrestling's Greatest Matches'', a series featuring the best matches in the company's history, made its U.S. debut on Saturday, January 10. After switching timeslots numerous times, both shows were cancelled in May. Also in May,
Dave Meltzer of the
Wrestling Observer Newsletter reported that Destination America had decided to cancel
Impact Wrestling by late September 2015. TNA vehemently denied the report, stating: "These false statements constitute defamation and if necessary we will seek all legal remedies available to us." The following week, Destination America signed a 26-week trial deal with
Ring of Honor (ROH) that would see
Ring of Honor Wrestling air as
Impact Wrestling's lead-in, which began on June 3.
Impact Wrestling subsequently began airing on Wednesdays starting in June. Beginning January 5, 2016,
Impact Wrestling aired Tuesday nights on
Pop. With the show's move to Pop,
Impact Wrestling received new theme music ("Roustabout" by
The Smashing Pumpkins'
Billy Corgan), a new stage, and a new opening intro for the first time in three years.
Impact Wrestling moved back to Thursday nights beginning July 21, 2016, in order to avoid airing directly opposite
WWE SmackDown, which moved to Tuesdays.
Early Anthem era (2017–2024) In 2017, TNA was acquired by
Anthem Sports & Entertainment, the owner of
Impact's Canadian broadcaster
Fight Network; in March 2017, TNA subsequently changed its name to Impact Wrestling to match the show's title. On July 4, 2017, after the company briefly rebranded as
Global Force Wrestling (GFW), the show's name was changed to
GFW Impact! (or simply,
Impact!). The GFW branding would be dropped in the October of that year, following the departure of
Jeff Jarrett and the subsequent cancellation of the merger with Impact Wrestling. After
Bound for Glory 2017 in November 2017, Impact would do a set of tapings in
Ottawa. Following the 2018
Redemption pay-per-view, Impact Wrestling would return to touring, taping in various smaller venues. The year's taping locations included
Windsor, Ontario,
Toronto,
Mexico City,
New York City, and
Las Vegas. In 2019, Impact Wrestling held tapings in
Philadelphia,
Dallas, New York City,
Houston, Windsor, Mexico City, Nashville, Toronto,
Rahway,
Fort Campbell,
Owensboro, and other venues in
Ontario. On January 11, 2019,
Impact!'s U.S broadcast moved to
Pursuit Channel, a channel partly owned by Anthem but with a significantly smaller subscriber base than Pop; To compensate, Impact Wrestling expanded their previous agreement with
Twitch to simulcast
Impact! episode broadcasts online, beginning with the Pursuit Channel debut on January 11. On September 9, 2019, Anthem purchased a majority stake in
AXS TV.
Impact! moved to AXS the following month, after
Bound for Glory on October 20, 2019, and continued to simulcast on the company's Twitch channel. The show moved to Tuesday nights, beginning on October 29, 2019. Due to the
COVID-19 pandemic, all
Impact! episode tapings were held
behind closed doors at Skyway Studios in
Nashville, Tennessee, beginning in April 2020 with the two-part
Rebellion special, which was taped from April 8 to 10, and broadcast from April 21 to 28. Beginning with
Hard to Kill on January 16, 2021, until
Slammiversary on July 17, 2021, crowd noises were piped into Impact Wrestling programming. In February 2021, Impact Wrestling launched a new one-hour preshow,
Before the Impact (abbreviated as
BTI), which premiered on February 16 on AXS TV in the U.S.
BTI features news, recaps of previous episodes of
Impact!, previews of the following episode, and an exclusive match.
BTI would replace
Xplosion, which was cancelled in March 2021. The two shows would crossover on the June 3 episodes, when
Josh Alexander faced
T. J. Perkins for the
X Division Championship in Impact Wrestling's first-ever 60-minute
Iron man match. The match began on
BTI and concluded in the opening minutes of
Impact!. On April 8, 2021,
Impact! moved back to Thursday nights. On August 4, 2021, Impact Wrestling launched a new
YouTube membership program called "Impact Wrestling Insiders", which would include day-and-date premieres of new
Impact! episodes. Subsequently, the promotion ended its partnership with Twitch; the final Twitch broadcast of
Impact! aired on July 29. On October 23, 2021, Impact held their first event outside of Nashville in a year and a half with
Bound for Glory, which took place just outside of
Las Vegas in
Sunrise Manor, Nevada, with Impact later resuming a full schedule of live touring in January 2022. In March 2023, Impact held events in
Windsor, Ontario, Canada. This marked their first shows outside of the U.S. in three years. Numerous other shows were held throughout
Canada all through the year.
Return of TNA Impact! (2024–present) In January 2024, Impact Wrestling reverted its name back to TNA, with its flagship weekly program likewise reverting back to
TNA Impact!. In mid-2024, TNA began a talent exchange agreement with WWE's
NXT brand, with selected NXT wrestlers beginning to appear on TNA programming, and TNA wrestlers beginning to make appearances on
WWE NXT. WWE and TNA later confirmed a long-term partnership in January 2025. On December 2, 2025, it was announced that
Impact! would move to
AMC and
AMC+ beginning on the
January 15, 2026 episode, at which time the program changed its title to
TNA Thursday Night Impact!. == Broadcast history ==