UFC fighter Justin Gaethje doing a backflip in the octagon during the UFC Freedom 250 event. Pool via CNP / SplashNews.com In today’s polarized world, no one can agree on even viewership data. The June 14 UFC fight on the White House lawn is a perfect case in point.
Two days after the fight, Status dubbed the numbers disappointing, citing a 7 million figure that it claimed was “less than half of a typical NFL game last season — 18.7 million viewers.” (But the NFL stat used by Status represents total viewers and not average viewers.)
By contrast, on a June 17 episode of “The Joe Rogan Experience,” the polarizing podcaster told guest Chase Hughes: “I don’t know what the total overall views are as of now, but I know that it was 150 million just by Monday.” Rogan was said to be referring to earned media, including YouTube and social media clips of the bouts, and that 150 million figure is consistent with Paramount’s data.
Back in February, TKO president and COO Mark Shapiro specifically cited earned media when predicting that “Freedom 250” would post Super Bowl-type numbers.
“To be clear, we see this once-in-a-lifetime stage as a strategic investment to drive subscriber acquisition at Paramount+, massive audience sampling for the UFC overall and Super Bowl-like earned media across the globe,” Shapiro said during a TKO Q4 earnings call.
Now that the dust has mostly settled, the total viewership tally is 34 million worldwide… and counting.
The “and counting” reflects that numbers from France and Spain, both of which had fighters facing off in the Octagon, are still outstanding and won’t come in until later this summer. According to Nielsen, the event drew 17 million viewers in the U.S. and Latin America, where it was streamed on Paramount+ — a figure that represented about 22% of the platform’s 79 million subscriber at the time. (Paramount+ now has some 80 million subscribers, with UFC fans likely contributing to 1 million newcomers.)
Even more murky, we’ve heard from multiple sources that a Netflix publicist pointed journalists covering “Freedom 250” ratings to its own average numbers in the U.S. for a May 16 match-up between Ronda Rousey and Gina Carano, which were better than the White House event.
But it wasn’t exactly apples-to-apples. The Rousey-Carano card was a single bout and not seven fights like “Freedom 250.” And it lasted just 17 seconds. Plus Netflix has 325M paid global subscribers. A better comparison, if there is one, is Rousey-Carano’s 17 million total viewers worldwide vs. the 34 million (“and counting”) for “Freedom 250.”
So why is everyone performing mathematical gymnastics over some bare-knuckle brawling?
For one, Netflix and Paramount were locked in their own brutal battle for Warner Bros. before Paramount put Netflix in a Hollywood armbar in February. And notably, President Trump — whose 80th birthday provided the reason for hosting “Freedom 250” on the White House lawn — is obsessed with ratings.
According to one film exec who has visited Mar-a-Lago, there are framed pages from the trades in the bathroom with “The Apprentice” holding the top spot. The executive noted to us that it was disconcerting “to take a piss while looking up at ‘The Apprentice’ dominating the charts.”
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