• by Wayne Friedman , 2 hours ago

In the battle of fight-centric TV sports, WWE and the UFC made big gains in new title sponsors in 2025, according to SponsorUnited.

A new report shows 67.3% of WWE’s brand partners (35) are new brands added to the sport that year versus the year before. For the UFC, 47.4% were new sponsors: 46. 

The two brands operate and are distributed by TKO Group Holdings. Combined efforts totaled 75 new brands, with some brands appearing across both. Overall, the two sports content providers have 136 unique brands, with a 55.1% overall new-entrant rate.

Estimates from SponsorUnited say UFC and WWE took in $474 million in sponsorship revenue -- $314 million from UFC and $160 million from WWE.

A big shift for WWE came from the sports producer's regular weekly “Raw” show -- which moved to Netflix in January 2025 from USA Network, a linear TV network, the year before.

Among the new brands buying “Raw” title-sponsorship inventory on Netflix were Snickers, Minute Maid, Cricket Wireless and Wingstop. Activations include physical canvas signage, overlay on-screen broadcast graphics, and sponsored “replay” segments.

Starting this year, Paramount Skydance began airing UFC with a total deal price of $7.7 billion for seven years, running through 2032. It has been airing events on linear TV and streaming platforms, CBS and Paramount+, respectively.

Previously UFC sports contests were airing under a pay-per-view model from ESPN.