UFC 252 was a huge success.
Once again, another UFC pay-per-view is a sucess in the pandemic era as the show drew 500,000 buys, according to Aron Bronsteter of TSN. 400,000 of those pay-per-view buys came in North America via ESPN+, while the remaining 100,000 came from overseas buyers.
The pay-per-view saw Stipe Miocic beat Daniel Cormier in a successful UFC Heavyweight title defense, with Marlon Vera becoming the first man to beat Sean O’Malley in a first-round knockout, Jairzinho Rozenstruik snapping his losing streak with a second-round TKO on Junior dos Santos, and Daniel Pineda also score a TKO win over Herbert Burns.
Ultimately, this number pales in comparison with UFC 251 as that pay-per-view drew a reported 1.4 million buys. UFC 246 – which was headlined with Conor McGregor vs. Donald Cerrone – is the second biggest show in 2020 with 1.0 million buys, and UFC 249 – which featured Justin Gaethje beating Tony Ferguson for the UFC Interim Lightweight Championship – had 700,000 buys.
The next UFC pay-per-view will be on Saturday, September 26, which is headlined by Israel Adesanya vs. Paulo Costa for the UFC Middleweight Championship.