POWERED BY SPND · SPONSORUNITED
2025 UFC & WWE
Sponsorship
Intelligence Report
Our first UFC and WWE sponsorship report for 2025: brand rankings, category, inventory, and athlete-level partnerships across UFC and WWE. Only approximately 13% of brands sponsor both properties, suggesting that even under shared TKO ownership since 2023, most buyers still view them as distinctive products.
TOTAL 2025 SPONSORSHIP SPND · COMBINED
$0M
TOTAL SPONSORSHIP DEALS
0
87 UFC · 49 WWE
AVERAGE DEAL SIZE · COMBINED
$3.2M - $3.5M
UFC $3.2M - $3.6M · WWE $2.7M - $2.8M
01A · Market size & spend
UFC and WWE combined to generate $474M in estimated 2025 sponsorship revenue, with UFC generating 2x more revenue.
| Metric | UFC | WWE | Combined |
|---|---|---|---|
| Total sponsorship revenue (estimated) | $314M | $160M | $474M |
| Total sponsorship deals | 87 | 49 | 136 |
| Average deal size (estimated) | $3.2M - $3.6M | $2.7M - $2.8M | $3.2M - $3.5M |
| Median deal size (estimated) | $2.72M | $2.36M | $2.46M |
SHARE OF COMBINED ESTIMATED SPND
$314M
UFC · 66%
$160M
WWE · 34%
Brand overlap
0
brands sponsor both UFC and WWE in 2025 — over 13% of the 136 combined unique brands.
Brands sponsoring both UFC & WWE (2025)
18 brands · child/consumer-brand level
01B · Top spending brands
WWE saw a higher percentage of new sponsors in 2025 than UFC — 67% of WWE's brand partners were new, versus 47% for UFC.
Brands unique to that property only
118
UFC 79 · WWE 39
Brands active in both properties
18
Child Brands
Net-new brands vs. 2024
75
UFC 46 · WWE 35
New-entrant rate
55.1%
UFC 47.4% · WWE 67.3%
"Net-new" means sponsors that were not active in the prior season. The combined net-new count of 75 is the true number of distinct new brands across the full TKO portfolio — not simply UFC's 46 plus WWE's 35, because some new brands may appear on both properties. The new-entrant rate is that 75 divided by the total 136 combined unique brands.
TOP 10 BRANDS BY ESTIMATED SPND — COMBINED
Parent-brand level
WWE's high new-entrant share coincided with the flagship weekly program Raw's early-2025 move to Netflix, which reportedly sold out its title-sponsor inventory to new advertisers — the data shows the two facts together, but does not prove causation. Several top WWE brands by asset volume (Cricket Wireless, Minute Maid, Snickers, TurboTax, Wingstop) are publicly named Netflix Raw sponsors, including TurboTax's first-of-its-kind March 2025 episode takeover. DoorDash is a genuine new-in-2025 cross-property deal; True Classic's March 2025 "Official Basics Wear Partner" news was a status upgrade on an existing 2024 UFC relationship, not a new entry.
01C · Top spending categories
Technology leads both properties by deal count, but Financial is the single biggest category by estimated spend.
Category deal count — comparison
ranked by total combined deals
TOP 10 CATEGORIES BY ESTIMATED SPND — COMBINED
Technology leads both properties by deal count (14 UFC / 9 WWE), but Financial, Beverage - Alcohol, Beverage - Non-Alcoholic, and Gaming, dominate estimated spend. Gaming (10 vs 1), Government (6 vs 1), and Healthcare (5 vs 0) concentrate almost entirely in UFC; Food Products and Leisure skew WWE.
02 · Inventory & the Octagon
Both properties sell mostly signage — but UFC has the Octagon arena, with 154 branded surfaces.
Asset grouping comparison
ASSET COUNTSUFC total
271
WWE total
181
Combined
452
excludes Digital Media (1 each)
WHICH BRANDS COVER THE MOST OF THE OCTAGON
UFC ONLYOut of nine cage and perimeter signage types — the cage surfaces plus bumpers, apron, and centerpiece logo. Nine is the maximum.
Vechain and VeBetter share a parent company and are listed separately.
WHO OWNS THE CAGE SURFACES
4 CAGE SURFACESThe four surfaces fighters actually stand on and walk through: mat, inner mat, corner pads, fighter gate.
Octagon signage in play
2025 BROADCAST STILLS
Corner Canvas Mat
Crypto.com
Peripheral Canvas Mat
Vechain
Horizontal Bumpers · Interior
Polymarket
Vertical Bumper
Bud Light
Signage is the biggest asset type for both properties — 183 of UFC's 271 assets and 102 of WWE's 181. They diverge after that: UFC's next-largest group is Property Rights & Exposure (74), while WWE leans on Venue & Events (41). The difference that matters is the Octagon: 154 of UFC's assets sit on the cage and its perimeter, inventory WWE simply doesn't have. Crypto.com leads both views — 6 of the 9 signage types, and the only brand holding all four cage surfaces — with alcohol and financial brands the heaviest buyers, tied at 20 assets each.
03 · Athlete deals & social following
Merab Dvalishvili leads all UFC and WWE athletes with 20 brand deals, while John Cena leads WWE with 6.
TOP 5 MOST-SPONSORED UFC ATHLETES
By distinct brands
Merab Dvalishvili20
Brandon Moreno18
Charles Oliveira18
Dustin Poirier16
Michael Chandler16Top 5 most-sponsored WWE performers
By distinct brands
John Cena6
Cody Rhodes5
Dominik Mysterio5
Bianca Belair4
Rey Mysterio3Top followed athletes · UFC or WWE
IG, X, TT, FB combined
John Cena (WWE)88.3M
Conor McGregor (UFC)72M
Roman Reigns (WWE)47.8M
Randy Orton (WWE)31M
Ilia Topuria (UFC)24MTop followed athletes · WWE
IG, X, TT, FB combined
John Cena88.3MRoman Reigns47.8MRandy Orton31MRey Mysterio22.6M
Seth Rollins16.5MTop followed athletes · UFC
IG, X, TT, FB combined
Conor McGregor72MIlia Topuria24M
Islam Makhachev17.9M
Khamzat Chimaev14.3M
Israel Adesanya14MUFC's roster produces a larger volume of athlete-level sponsorships than WWE — its top five fighters carry 81 distinct brands against 20 for WWE's top five — but in both properties those rosters barely intersect. Monster Energy is the only brand sponsoring more than two of UFC's top five, appearing with Dvalishvili, Moreno, and Chandler, while no brand reaches more than two of WWE's, and John Cena shares no sponsor with any of his four peers. Social reach follows a different hierarchy: John Cena leads the combined list with 88.3M followers across Instagram, X, TikTok, and Facebook before his December 2025 retirement, followed by Conor McGregor at 72M. Established WWE performers dominate pure reach, while McGregor remains UFC's single largest draw. Social follower counts are directional and subject to platform fluctuation.
Key findings
Five things the data makes clear
UFC and WWE are a combined half-billion-dollar sponsorship business, and the money is concentrated in five categories.
Across 136 deals in 2025, UFC and WWE generated $474M in sponsorship revenue — $314M UFC (66%) and $160M WWE (34%) — with combined average deal sizes between $3.2M and $3.5M. Just five categories account for more than half of that total: Financial, Beverage-Alcohol, Beverage-Non-Alcoholic, Gaming, and Food Products. The top 10 categories account for 80%.
A short list of brands spends most of the money.
The top-spending categories are a handful of recognizable brands — Financial is Crypto.com, Vechain, TurboTax and Chase; Gaming is DraftKings, Stake and BetBoom; Beverage-Alcohol is Bud Light and Budweiser, Jose Cuervo and Wheatley Vodka; Beverage-Non-Alcoholic is Monster Energy, Prime Hydration and Minute Maid; Food Products is Slim Jim, Snickers and Thorne. Ten parent brands alone account for $165.4M, roughly 35% of all 2025 spend. Almost all of them are single-property brands, so category strength on one side rarely carries over to the other.
Brands buy UFC and WWE as two separate marketplaces.
Only approximately 13% of sponsoring brands are active on both properties in 2025. Financial, Alcoholic, and Non-Alcoholic Beverages are major sponsorship categories across both WWE and UFC.
UFC and WWE don't just sell to different brands — they sell different things.
Signage is the biggest piece for both — about two-thirds of UFC's sponsorship assets and just over half of WWE's. After that they split: roughly a quarter of UFC's assets are property rights like naming and exclusivity, while a similar share of WWE's is venue and event presence. And UFC has something WWE simply doesn't — the Octagon itself, where canvas, mat, corner and fighter-gate placements put a logo inside the fight. A brand that wants to be seen during the competition has one choice inside TKO; a brand that wants to be seen around the event has another.
Most UFC and WWE athletes win on either reach or deal volume — not both.
Merab Dvalishvili leads all UFC athletes with 20 distinct brand deals, and John Cena leads WWE with 6. But by audience, the top three across both properties are Cena (88.3M followers), Conor McGregor (72M) and Roman Reigns (47.8M). Cena is the only name that tops both lists; on the UFC side, endorsement volume and reach are landing on entirely different athletes.
Methodology & data notes
How this report was built
SEASON SCOPE
This report covers the 2025 season for UFC and WWE, with 2024 as the prior-season comparison. Neither league runs a traditional season, so 2025 means the full calendar year. A deal counts if it was active at any point in that year — not only if it was newly signed. Coverage spans league and event sponsorships plus individual fighter and Superstar deals. Asset-level detail exists for 2025 only, so 2024 comparisons are limited to brands, deals, and spend. Figures reflect the SponsorUnited platform as of August 2026 and may shift as deals are added.
DEAL COUNT
SponsorUnited tracked 149 sponsorship deals across the two leagues in 2025 — 97 with UFC, 52 with WWE. Of those, 136 have a spend estimate or "SPND" attached (87 UFC, 49 WWE). Since this data is not live on our platform yet, the counts of brands, categories, and assets use all 149. Every dollar figure uses the 136.The two are never added together.
ESTIMATED PRICING "SPND"
All dollar figures are estimated using SponsorUnited's proprietary SPND™ pricing model — not reported or actual valuations — unless otherwise noted.
BRAND VS. PARENT COMPANY
Deal counts use the brand a fan sees — Bud Light, Budweiser, and Spaten each count separately. Spend rankings roll them up to the parent company, so all three appear once as AB InBev.
ATHLETE & SOCIAL DATA
Endorsement deal counts include any brand that had a sponsorship or digital asset with an athlete in the 2025 season. Social data combines Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and Facebook followers.
OCTAGON
Octagon signage is UFC only — WWE has no equivalent. Each brand is credited once for every type of signage it holds, so this counts variety, not screen time. Two views: the four cage surfaces alone, and all nine types, which adds the bumpers, apron, and centerpiece logo. The four are part of the nine, so the same brand scores higher in the wider view.