The inaugural UFL season is in the books, with the Birmingham Stallions claiming their third championship in a row after winning the previous two USFL championships.
Birmingham’s win over the San Antonio Brahmas in Sunday’s UFL Championship averaged 1.596 million viewers, making it the most-watched spring football championship game since the XFL’s first title game back in 2001.
To be fair, we’re not exactly talking about a large sample size of spring football games here. The Alliance of American Football and XFL both shut down before their title games in 2019 and 2020, respectively. The USFL returned in 2022, averaging 1.52 million viewers on Fox for the 2022 championship and 1.157 million for the 2023 title game on NBC. The XFL closed its return season in 2023 with 1.436 million viewers for its championship on ABC.
Overall, the UFL averaged 850,000 viewers per game for its full 2024 season, including 945,000 viewers on broadcast TV (ABC and Fox) and 630,000 on cable (FS1, ESPN, ESPN2). Last season, the USFL and XFL combined to average 635,000 viewers across all networks, though more of those games aired on cable and went head-to-head with each other.
In 2025, the UFL season will be a bit different, with many games moving to Friday night windows on Fox to make way for the network’s Indycar coverage. Friday night windows on Fox will be reserved for live sports following WWE Smackdown‘s move to USA Network in September. In addition to the UFL, Fox will air college football and basketball on Friday nights in the fall and winter.
[Data via Sports Media Watch]
