WWE Heat WWE Heat ( formerly known as WWE Sunday Night Heat ) is a professional wrestling show for World Wrestling Entertainment , showcasing talent from the " Raw " roster with lower - card matches . It is currently being streamed on WWE . com on Friday afternoons for North American viewers . However , the show is still televised internationally and shows in the United Kingdom on Sky Sports 3 , Indonesia on Lativi , Australia on FOX8 , India on Ten Sports , Latin America on FX , Germany on Premiere Sport Portal , and the Philippines on Jack TV . It has been previously aired on USA Network , MTV and Spike TV in the United States , Channel 4 in the United Kingdom and CTV Sportsnet in Canada . History . The show was originally introduced as WWF Sunday Night Heat on the USA Network in 1998 . The one hour show would be broadcasted live on Sunday nights at 7pm Eastern . It was the second most important show in the WWF line - up serving as a supplement to the " Monday Night RAW " program . " HEAT " would feature promos , vignettes and in - ring action just like " RAW " , and in many ways , it was what " SmackDown ! " was to " RAW " from 1999 to 2002 . Upper mid - card and main event wrestlers were no strangers to " HEAT " , appearing each week . Storylines from the previous week would progress during the show , and the next day ' s " RAW " would be heavily promoted . The show itself was a big ratings draw for the USA Network trailing not too far behind the big numbers of " RAW " . With the advent of " SmackDown " in 1999 , " HEAT " has significantly decreased in importance as well as ratings . The debut of " SmackDown ! " also led to HEAT being taped before " SmackDown " with matches for WWF syndication programs like Jakked / Metal to be taped before " RAW " broadcasts . Near the peak of WWE ' s popularity and as part of WWE ' s television deal with Viacom , the show was moved to MTV . { C WWE has also aired two special editions of " Halftime HEAT " which aired during halftime of Super Bowl XXXIII on USA Network . These specials ended following the movement of " HEAT " to MTV . In 2000 , the current logo and theme song was adopted . Since the brand extension in 2002 , " HEAT " has been broadcast with only " RAW " superstars and reverted to being before " RAW " . The exception to this was on pay - per - view nights , which were broadcast live from the pay - per - view venue and could involve " SmackDown ! " wrestlers . In May 2002 , " SmackDown ! " branched off its own sister show , " Velocity " , which mirrored the same characteristics as " HEAT " . Now , WWE tends to use this program to showcase the talent that they do not use frequently on " RAW " . Fans often refer to this show as the minor leagues , a B - Show , for the wrestlers on the show are usually at the beginning or the end of their careers in WWE . Occasionally , main eventers and champions will appear on the show , and usually win . " HEAT " is also used to review the main events that happened on the previous edition of " Raw " . When " SmackDown " premiered in August 1999 , " HEAT " briefly became a complete recap show , with exclusive interviews and feuds recapped as music videos . This only lasted a few weeks , and the show began airing exclusive matches again , this time taping before " SmackDown " . When the show started airing on MTV in late 2000 , it was broadcast live from WWF New York . WWF Superstars would appear at the restaurant as special guests while Michael Cole & Tazz would call pre - taped matches live . This practice ended in 2002 and the show reverted to its original format of taping the matches , again before RAW and have the commentators call the action and have it burned to the matches . Steven Richards , who at one time was the most regular competitor on " Sunday Night HEAT " , dubbed himself " General Manager of " HEAT " " ( though he carried out no GM duties ) and began calling the show " Stevie Night HEAT " . " HEAT " and " Velocity " were not picked up by the USA Network when WWE moved its programming over to that network in October 2005 , leaving Americans no way to watch WWE weekend shows on television . To solve this problem , WWE decided to stream the shows on their website exclusively for the US audience , with new editions posted every Friday afternoon . " Velocity " was eventually axed when ECW was resurrected in 2006 , and " Sunday Night HEAT " was soon renamed to WWE HEAT , as it no longer aired on Sundays . After a while , HEAT was changed to Heat to be equal to the Raw brand without capitialization in the name . " Heat " is still shown overseas to fulfill international programming commitments . For a while , a special 30 - minute live edition of " Heat " began airing in place of the traditional pre - taped Free For All PPV preshow , although this is no longer the case . As Heat is taped before " Raw " , Heat uses the same set as Raw ( ring ropes , TitanTron , ramp ) with the only exception being the Heat logos on the TitanTron and the MiniTron . { C Since the shows debut on WWE . com , it has been broken up into 4 segments ( each match ) . On February 16 , 2007 on Heat ' s website for the latest edition of " Heat " , it was shown that now audiences can watch the show in one whole go or continue watching the four segments . Commentators and hosts . There have been many commentators in the history of " Heat " . Industry veterans and RAW broadcasters Jim Ross and Jerry Lawler have done commentary on the show . The show was also the launchpad for Shane McMahon ' s on - camera career in WWE , originally placed in the role of a commentator for the program . In October 2000 , the show was hosted by Rebecca Budig and MTV VJ / Rapper DJ Skribble when it moved from USA Network to MTV . During pay - per - view events and often outside the stadium , hosts introduce segments of the show , recently the hosts of The WWE Experience ( Ivory and Todd Grisham ) perform these duties . If a " SmackDown " brand pay - per - view takes place , " SmackDown " ' s main show announcers host the in - ring commentary for the show . Often wrestlers would take the role of color commentators on the show with Al Snow , Tommy Dreamer , Raven , and D ' Lo Brown all holding this position mostly as a replacement for an announce who was unavailable . During the show ' s run on MTV , diva Lita also served as a commentator following her major neck injury . Before the WWE - produced , Extreme Championship Wrestling reunion pay - per - view , One Night Stand 2005 took place , a special Extreme HEAT episode was broadcast and hosted by Jonathan Coachman and Michael Cole . During one episode when Jonathan Coachman was unavailable , former ECW announcer ( and then - lead " RAW " announcer ) Joey Styles took part in the show . However , Styles then quit on the following Monday ' s ' RAW , meaning Grisham ran the show alone .