Boxing weighs in as undisputed combat PPV champion
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Joseph O'Halloran
| 23 October 2019

The inaugural State Of The Sports Streaming Industry report from digital streaming combat sports platform FITE has found that combat sports are not struggling to make weight when it comes to PPV and streaming.

FITE streams over 1,000 combat sporting events a year analysed data generated from pay-per-view (PPV) combat sports events its digital platform offers to its 1.6 million registered viewers. The survey includes data on viewership, geographic breakdown of fans who typically stream pay-per-view sporting events, how they are tuning in, a ranking of popular streaming devices and preferred combat sporting events – from boxing and MMA to pro wrestling and bare-knuckle fighting.

Overall, the majority of combat sports PPV users are in North America and Western Europe, with the US paying on average more for events. While TV’s still reign supreme in terms of the device used to view these events, mobile and tablets are gaining popularity, particularly in places like Europe and South America. TV platforms in North America captured around half of the digital viewing time, followed by Europe/Australia (30-35%) and South America (24%).

The survey found that boxing was the most popular PPV sport to watch: nearly 55% of PPV combat sports buyers were interested in boxing, with 40% interested in pro wrestling and nearly 40% interested in MMA.

Yet there were some surprisingly stats regarding overlaps. While there were some crossovers with MMA and boxing, wrestling and boxing fans did not overlap. Half of MMA fans expressed interested in boxing, while a third of boxing and wrestling fans were interested in MMA. Only a third of MMA fans were interested in wrestling and boxing fans were found to be not interested in wrestling, and wrestling fans are not interested in boxing.

But people were more than willing to pay. Not surprisingly, PPV prices were the highest in the US with an average of $49 purchase price, followed by Canada, which averages $30. The most popular PPV price ranges are $50+, $30-$40, $10-$20, with PPV buyers significantly more likely to make multiple purchases in the lower price tiers. Mobile app users are most likely to make several purchases, followed by TV platforms and then the web.

There were also clear regional differences in terms of how fans watched services. While North Americans expressed a clear wish to stream PPV via TV platforms, fans in Europe and South America prefer to tune in via mobile and computer. Those in Europe and Australia spend 50% more time watching PPVs on the computer and phone compared with TV platforms. The survey also found that casting to TV streaming devices such as Chromecast from mobile apps increased viewing time by over 40%.

Combat sports were also extending their reach among viewers. Female viewership was found to be on the rise. As many as 87% of combat sports viewers are male, but female viewership accounts for 13% of total viewers, with two-thirds of users being between the ages of 25-44 years old.

“The streaming space, particularly sports streaming, is huge right now and growing quickly – every few weeks we're seeing a new provider emerge,” commented FITE CEO Kosta Jordanov on the FITE's 2019 State of the Industry Report.