UFC 323 was supposed to carry the momentum of a stacked year—a final pay-per-view headlined by two title fights, a sold-out arena, and a night in which practically every prelim fighter delivered chaos. But once the broadcast numbers came in, a different story began circulating. Not about the card’s quality, but its reach. For the first time this year, the energy inside T-Mobile Arena didn’t translate to screens at home.

Instead, the UFC 323 prelims had the lowest viewership of any prelim slate in 2025, a stark contrast to a night packed with stoppages, knockouts, and breakout performances. While the main card delivered in full, the prelim slump has become the talking point—one that does not reflect what fans inside the arena witnessed.

UFC 323 prelims numbers struggle to meet expectations

The numbers weren’t kind at all. The FX broadcast opened at 333K, while the ESPN2 simulcast dropped even lower to 282K, putting UFC 323 at the very bottom of the year’s rankings. The comparison made it sting even more: UFC 322 drew 577K, UFC 320 drew 519K, and previous events, such as UFC 316 and UFC 314, easily surpassed 1 million.

UFC 323 stood out like a sore thumb in a year of record-breaking events. However, the event itself was far from flat. The prelims delivered finishes nearly from start to finish, with only two fights going the distance over the whole card. Manuel Torres dominated Grant Dawson in the first round, earning a $50,000 bonus.

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Iwo Baraniewski and Ibo Aslan swung as if they had 90 seconds to live, with Baraniewski landing the last blow in a firefight that went into fan folklore. Jalin Turner destroyed Edson Barboza, Fares Ziam annihilated Nazim Sadykhov, and Mairon Santos finished his fight in just 21 seconds in Round 3.

That’s the irony: the action was all a promoter could wish for; it just didn’t get the attention it needed. So, what happened? Some blame network positioning, others scheduling fatigue, and a few blame the shift in attention toward the year-end main event storylines. But inside the UFC 323 arena, none of that mattered.

The crowd reacted as if they were watching the best prelim run of the year. It just happened to be the one that, statistically, the fewest people saw. For fighters like Torres and Baraniewski, who stole the show before the champs even arrived, the numbers will not erase the chaos that they brought.

However, the contrast remains stark: the worst-performing prelims of 2025 provided some of the year’s top moments, but not enough viewers to match them. And while the numbers were low in terms of ratings, the fighters did go home with some mega checks in their hands, as the UFC 323 promotional guidelines compliance revealed.

UFC 323 sees massive compensation at the final ESPN pay-per-view

This contrast made the payouts stand out much more. For a preliminary card that barely registered on the ratings list, the checks offered an entirely different story. When the guideline totals were announced, it revealed that $363,500 was distributed throughout the roster, a considerable sum for a night that failed to attract viewers. Champions Merab Dvalishvili and Alexandre Pantoja took home $42,000 each, while title contenders Petr Yan and Joshua Van earned $32,000 each for stepping into championship bouts.

Fighters in the 16–20 fight bracket, such as Marvin Vettori and Henry Cejudo, got $16,000, while seasoned veterans Edson Barboza and Jan Blachowicz earned $21,000 each. Lower-tier payouts stacked up quickly as well: fighters with 11–15 UFC matches, like Maycee Barber and Jalin Turner, earned $11,000, while those with 6–10 fights, including Tatsuro Taira, Payton Talbott, Chris Duncan, and Manuel Torres, earned $6,000.

Newer fighters like Iwo Baraniewski, Fares Ziam, and Mansur Abdul-Malik left with $4,000–$4,500. Then came the bonuses. Manuel Torres and Iwo Baraniewski, both preliminary fighters, added $50,000 to their totals, while Petr Yan and Merab Dvalishvili won Fight of the Night, earning an additional $50,000 each. Even though the UFC 323 prelims had the smallest crowd of the year, the fighters who came up and delivered received some of the highest payouts of the night.