If you already thought that the UFC’s pay-per-view prices were high then unfortunately there’s some bad news on the way as ESPN have announced plans to raise the price again by a further $5 in 2023.
That means that UFC fans in North America will now a whopping $79.99 per event next year. With roughly one PPV per month being standard practice for the promotion that will leave dedicated fans paying close to $1,000 to watch them all, not to mention also having to shell out $9.99 a month for ESPN+ in order to be able to have access to buying those events in the first place.
At the start of 2020 the UFC PPV’s were only $59.99, but were raised to $64.99 months later, and then bumped up to $69.99 in 2021, and $74.99 in 2022.
Though the increasingly steep price tag may scare off some viewers, the reality is that the UFC posted it’s best ever financial results earlier this year, raking in over $1 billion between April 1st, 2021 and March 31st, 2022.
Despite that it’s worth noting that the UFC doesn’t actually control the price of their pay-per-view events as that is down to ESPN and their parent company Disney, who began a five-year television and digital rights deal with the promotion back in 2019.
In a statement issued alongside the latest PPV price raise, Disney stated that it, “reflects the value of ESPN+ and the popularity and quality of UFC events.”
The new $79.99 price tag will begin with UFC 273 in January, which will feature two title fights, with Glover Teixeira and Jamahal Hill fighting for the vacant light-heavyweight title, which in the co-main event, flyweight champion Deiveson Figueiredo goes up against his old rival Brandon Moreno for the fourth time.
