Saturday night’s UFC fight Night 178 event was watched by an average of 1,097,000 million viewers on ESPN.
It should be noted however that though the event was scheduled to begin airing on the channel at 10.30pm, it was only available to watch on ESPN+ for the first half hour due to a college football game between Georgia and Auburn overrunning, which will have had a positive impact on the ratings.
Nevertheless, it’s still good news for the UFC as on paper this was considered to be one of the weakest events on the Fight Island schedule, yet was the 4th highest rated show on Cable on Saturday and drew a 0.4 rating in the 18-49 demographic.
Overall that meant that the event was the second highest rated UFC on ESPN show of the year so far, and those who tuned in were treated to one of Holm’s best ever Octagon performances as she dismantled Irene Aldana over the course of five rounds in the main event.
The ratings continue a strong run viewership wise for the UFC in recent months and bodes well for bigger events to come before the end of the Fight Island run, including October 17th’s Brian Ortega vs. The Korean Zombie headliner and the blockbuster UFC 254: Khabib vs. Gaethje pay-per-view on October 24th.
