UFC: ESPN raised PPV prices ‘a little quicker and a little higher’ than expected, leading to more piracy

Photo by Lee Coleman/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

UFC pay-per-view prices have increased four times since inking a broadcast deal with ESPN, and that’s led to even more piracy of events.

During a quarterly financial call on Thursday, TKO Group Holdings president Mark Shapiro acknowledged that ESPN controls the costs of the pay-per-views, which is ESPN’s right after signing a deal to include those premium events as part of the company’s broadcast rights deal with the UFC. Since striking that deal in 2019, ESPN has raised the prices of pay-per-views from $59.99 at launch to the current $79.99 cost in 2023.

While UFC constantly battles against piracy of those pay-per-view events, Shapiro mentioned that the increased cost almost certainly resulted in even higher numbers of pirated cards, which led to a conversation with ESPN about those rising prices.

“ESPN and Disney were very aggressive, if you will, on pricing the pay-per-views and they have full control over that, but they have control given what they’re paying us for those rights,” Shapiro said. “Over the period of our partnership, they probably went a little quicker and a little higher than we would have liked.

“We voiced that to them, especially in this era of piracy where we’re seeing our piracy numbers really jacked up and we think that’s driven by them pricing it too high. They were very receptive to that feedback.”

Shapiro revealed that executives from TKO sat down with ESPN chairman Jimmy Pitaro to express concerns over the increased price of pay-per-views.

That led to new package deals where ESPN offered lower pricing on events where fans could purchase a card well ahead of time to save money versus purchasing a card on fight night or within a few days of an event, which is typical.

“We had a meeting in Las Vegas a few months ago with Jimmy Pitaro and Dana [White],” Shapiro said. “They took the price down, if you will, in terms of offering a new marketing promotion where if you buy by a certain date, well in advanced of the numbered fights, you are going to get a discount and then the price of course increases once you pass that date. They’re seeing good success with that.”

While live event revenue for UFC has exploded in recent years, it doesn’t appear that pay-per-view sales have seen the same success.

That being said, Shapiro believes the overall market for UFC pay-per-views is finally settling down again, which he expects to lead to increased revenue in the future.

“Like audiences in the live events where we’re selling out and breaking records and you see it all in the press release, and like the yield that we’re commanding, which in many cases specifically with WWE have been higher than we even planned for, we’re also sustaining our buys when it comes to pay-per-view,” Shapiro said. “So we feel really good about that.”

Since announcing an increase in cost for UFC pay-per-views at the end of 2022, ESPN has not changed the price for those events over the past 20 months.

ESPN maintains broadcast rights over UFC until the end of 2025. The two sides are expected to begin negotiations on potentially reaching an agreement on a new deal early next year.