Dave Meltzer of The Wrestling Observer reports that the buy rate for UFC 200 is estimated to be between 1.1 to 1.2 million PPV buys. In addition, there are reports that UFC 199 drew 320,000 PPV buys.
UFC 200 featured Amanda Nunes and Miesha Tate. However, Brock Lesnar was the real feature of the card. Of course, news hit Friday night that Lesnar was flagged by USADA for a potential violation of the UFC anti-doping policy. As we know, Jon Jones was pulled from his fight against Daniel Cormier during fight week. Despite the issues, the UFC Prelims drew the third-highest ratings for a prelims show on the network despite starting 30 minutes late due to baseball.
Last month’s UFC 199 featured Luke Rockhold and Michael Bisping (who replaced Chris Weidman) and Dominick Cruz facing Urijah Faber. For UFC 199, the Prelims drew 798,000 viewers and 500,000 google searches for “UFC 199” on the day of the fight which may have indicated the estimated buy rate.
2016 PPV buy rates
UFC 195 – 300,000
UFC 196 – 1.5 million
UFC 197 – 450,000
UFC 198 – not known at this time
UFC 199 – 320,000
UFC 200 – ~1.1-1.2 million
Payout Perspective:
The 1.1-1.2 million should be seen as a very good buy rate considering the Jon Jones issue and the lack of a Rousey or McGregor on the card. The buy rate reflects the fact that Brock Lesnar was a big draw (once again) for the UFC. Thus, the news of his potential drug test failure brings into question a lot of things related to the use of Lesnar on the card and the decision to waive him from waiting four months per the UFA anti-doping rules.
The card falls apart and they still hit 1m plus buys. That’s impressive.
Card fell apart last minute, I’m sure sports bars and people had already paid for it. Not good considering it was supposed to be the biggest card ever.
What fight fan said. Card fell apart a day or so before the show. People had already spent their money.
And Lesnar and Silva were almost as big a draw as McGregor. If it hadn’t been for Lesnar, the event would probably have been cancelled due to lack of sales.
It’s becoming clearer and clearer that the UFC is just a product of hype and marketing gimmicks. Bellator and WSOF are better.
Hahahahahaha
Cain,,aldo,edgar,tate,anderson,cormier,brock lesnar and the “200” event last one was 7 years ago? VS. Connor mcgregor….the ufc brand is declining fast….most of ppv are brock fans
The dictatorship is ending….its all about the fighters now hahaha…..maybe a lot of dw fanboys got demoralize of the sale?
Tops that’s why they wanted to sell, Ali act coming along with their stars losing
Sports bars do not count for ppv numbers and people do not buy ppvs typically until the last minute. Jones was removed a few days before.
Also, no one thought this was going to be the biggest card ever. The UFC is on a roll ppv wise. This is the most impressive streak for any combat sports promotion ever over the past 8 months. It is on another level.
Zuffa sold because someone offered them 4.1b. Had nothing to do with Ali Act according to every source.
Actually 200 was supposed to be the biggest show ever back before Mctapper got put in check.
300k ppvs is hardly a roll lol
And d according to Dana and the FerLiars the ufc isn’t for sale lol
LOL at tards saying thats not a good number? Anything over a million buys is great, card lost its main event two days before, didnt have McGregor or Ronda or GSP and still did big.
Great number.
and yes bars def had card paid before in advance but nobody at home is ordering the PPV days before, if anything they probably lost buys once Jones was out.
Great number though and they actually will make more because now next month 202 will do over a million buys. Had McGregor been on the card it would have broken UFC PPV record but that card in Aug would have had Mighty Mouse on it or something so they will get two PPV that do over a million buys.
Getting Brock was big, if he wasnt on the card I dont think it hits a million and that would have been disappointing.
This will be our biggest pay-per-view event,” said Marshall Zelaznik, exec-VP and chief content officer, UFC. “We’ve made sure that all our distribution partners are prepared for an onslaught. Every effort has been made to prepare for the crush of orders. It’s a monumental moment for us.”
Hahahaha…it was an onslaught alright hahahaha
Yeah, so hitting 1m plus in ppv buys 5 times within 9 months is not impressive. Hahahaha? FF’s delusions.
Yeah topps, what a failure, over 1m plus buys and possibly 1.2m. Can you name any promotion that has done that in over the past year? Oh yeah, you can’t.
FYI, that quote was before Jones and McGregor pulled out and they STILL had a huge number.
Huge number? 100 did bigger numbers 7 years ago. They couldn’t even sell the place out.
If that’s the case, why has no boxing promotion hit 1m or even less than half of that number in the past 14 months? Haha.
Yeah, hitting 1m plus ppv buys is a huge number.
D, nobody mentioned boxing until you came back. Facts are facts, and it is a fact that the PPV was nowhere near as big as it was hyped to be. Even old boxing ppv’s top that like tyson vs lewis, de la hoya vs trinidad. This was supposed to be the highest selling UFC ever and guess what? It wasn’t.
Btw where have you been? It was awfully quiet around here.
No one other than you and every other t.roll on here.
Facts are facts, I just laid them out for you, which you are in denial of . The UFC just sold for 4b which is a massive number, their ppv’s are at an all time high- shattering combat sports records, they just had a make shift ppv that hit well over 1m buys. Haha. Think about that.
The evidence shows the contrary about the quiet here.
Well, I know where you’ve been. Your local bww’s.
If dw did not beg and pleaded hahaha wwe.and.promoting wwe on ufc 200….how many ppv buys could ufc brand get?
So theoretically if mcgregor promotes himself with his promotion he can rival ufc ppv hahaha…TMT…fighters no longer dw slaves…ali act
UFC 198 is around 275 k
UFC 200 is actually 900 k with cable # yet to be finalized so 1.1 million is within reach
Guys I dont see how in any way that 1.2m buys is doomsaying for the UFC. It was a good night of buys regardless of when they were bought. I agree that WSOF and Bellator are more entertaining, Strikeforce was the best of them all for me. IF anything can be said of this it confirms what I have said for a while now, the UFC is now a star driven promotion…the bigger the stars, the higher the PPV buys. Having said that, I have not ordered a UFC in 2 years now and will not be ever again.
Wil, it was not 1.2 million buys
it will hit somewhere around 1.05 to 1.1 million based on current projections. that is a successful number. but they did spend a lot of money on the event so not sure how much profit will be seen.
Someone said 1M ppvs is great no matter what and thats just not true.
If May/Pac did 2M ppvs or lower it would’ve been called a massive failure.
To big up UFC 200 as the biggest card ever and to only get 1M ppvs? Thats not a success, and thats with Brock who is easily bigger and more popular than anyone the UFC has. U have mma fans, mainstream fans, and WWE fans and all you get is 1M?