UFC 211 Preliminary Card Delivers Big Ratings
The UFC put on their most stacked card of the year thus far this past weekend with UFC 211 and their prelims, which featured several slugfests as well as exciting bouts, delivered with good viewership. The viewership numbers for the event are in. The prelims, which were headlined by Eddie Alvarez vs. Dustin Poirier, pulled in 1,148,000 viewers. UFC 211 prelims viewership was up from the UFC 210 prelims that did 723,000 and UFC 209 prelims that had 1,033,000 viewers.
UFC 211 took place on Saturday, May 13, 2017 at the American Airlines Center in Dallas, Texas. Three bouts aired on the UFC Fight Pass prelims at 5:30 p.m. ET while the FX prelims aired at 8 p.m. ET. The five bouts will take place on the main card that aired on pay-per-view (PPV) at 10 p.m. ET.
The pre-fight show drew 522,000, while the viewership numbers for the post-fight show drew 329,000. UFC 211 pre-fight show was up from the 268,000 viewers that UFC 210 drew. The weigh-ins did not rank in the top 150 shows on cable. For those who want comparisons, here are the viewership numbers for the last three UFC PPV preliminary cards that aired on FX:
UFC 188: 727,000
UFC 185: 1,003,000
UFC 174: 784,000
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 buy rate, then the prelims and the post-fight show does good viewership numbers. Both the UFC and FOX have to be happy with these numbers.
Fight fans will have to take a break from action as the UFC does not hold an event until May 28th. UFC Fight Night 109 will be held at Ericsson Globe in Stockholm, Sweden. A light heavyweight bout between former title challengers Alexander Gustafsson and Glover Teixeira will serve as the main event.
