UFC 329 wasn’t quite as big as UFC White House, but it was close.
On Thursday, Paramount+ — the exclusive broadcast partner for the UFC — released viewership numbers for this past weekend’s big number event, headlined by the return of Conor McGregor after a five-year layoff. Across the U.S. and Latin America, the UFC 329 card reached 15.9 million total viewers, according to Nielsen and Adobe Analytics. That number falls just short of last month’s UFC White House event, which drew 17 million viewers across the two markets.
UFC 329 also came up short in comparison to UFC White House in terms of averages, drawing 6.5 million average viewers across both markets, whereas UFC White House pulled 8.2 million in the same category.
However, UFC 329 did beat UFC White House in one key metric — UFC 329 peaked at 8.3 million concurrent streams during the event, while UFC White House only drew 7.9 million. This makes UFC 329 the second-biggest live event in Paramount+ history for concurrent live streams, just behind Super Bowl LVIII, which drew 11.5 million.
While UFC 329 may fall just short of UFC White House in most metrics, the event is still an unqualified success, particularly in reference to other major UFC events of the past. For comparison, the first-ever UFC card on FOX — headlined by a heavyweight title fight between Cain Velasquez and Junior dos Santos — averaged 5.7 million viewers in the U.S. and peaked with 8.8 million viewers.
It’s worth noting that viewership numbers tend to peak during the main event of fight cards, and Conor McGregor vs. Max Holloway 2 only lasted 69 seconds after McGregor immediately injured himself. Also, UFC 329 went head-to-head with the World Cup quarterfinal match between Argentina and Switzerland, which could have affected the numbers.
