UFC 207 Preliminary Card Brings In Massive Ratings
The UFC 207 prelims did very well, to say the least. The prelims, which were headlined by Johny Hendricks and Neil Magny, drew 1,511 million viewers.
UFC 207 took place on December 30th at the T-Mobile Arena in Paradise, Nevada. The prelims kicked off at 7:30 p.m. ET with one bout while the rest of the prelims aired on FOX Sports 1 at 8 p.m. ET with four bouts. The main card started at 10 p.m. ET on PPV with five bouts.
The pre-fight show drew 572,000 viewers, the post-fight show did 404,000 viewers, and Thursday’s weigh-in show did 216,000 viewers. With the post-fight show doing good numbers is a good sign for PPV buys as that meant that a lot of people were interested enough to hang out and catch the results/highlights of the actual PPV main card after the event aired. Usually when a PPV event does a good/great PPV buyrate, then the prelims and the post-fight show does good viewership numbers.
The UFC 207 prelims viewership was up from the UFC 206 prelims that did 771,000 viewers. While the UFC 207 prelims did not outdraw UFC 205 prelims, it still did a really good number. Granted, UFC 205 had a great preliminary lineup that was headlined by Frankie Edgar and Jeremy Stephens and had Conor McGregor fighting in the main event, which always boosts ratings for UFC prelim cards. The UFC 204 prelims drew 678,000 viewers. Obviously, Ronda Rousey had a big factor in the viewership even though she was fighting in the main event. When a big name is on the PPV card, the prelims usually do good viewership numbers.
The event went up against the Orange Bowl that did 11,461 million viewers on ESPN. The UFC has a break in the action as their next event takes place on January 15th.
