
Heading into Week 8 of the UFL 2025 season, the league has averaged 612,000 viewers per game across FOX, ABC, ESPN, and FS1–a 26% decrease overall from last year’s average weekly viewership.
With high playoff stakes in this past weekend’s UFL action on over-the-air network television. The UFL delivered with high-quality games and broadcasts, which saw the debut of Tim Brando, Chase Daniel, and the continued excellence of Joe Tessitore on the call. Did it all translate to better viewership numbers?
UFL 2025 Season: Week 8 TV Ratings (Average Viewership)
This past Friday night’s overtime shootout on FOX, in which the Memphis Showboats outlasted the San Antonio Brahmas, averaged 573,000 viewers–Up from last week’s 5/9 FOX game, which had an average viewership of 540,000.
The Brahmas-Showboats OT thriller peaked at 688,000 viewers for the game’s conclusion from 11-11:15 ET. This is a reversal in an ongoing trend on FOX Fridays, where UFL games have peaked in the first quarter of telecasts.
For the first and only time this season, FOX presented a split regional broadcast of two UFL games simultaneously at 1 pm ET on Saturday, 5/17.
The timeslot for the St. Louis Battlehawks-Birmingham Stallions and Michigan Panthers-Houston Roughnecks games averaged 591,000 viewers.
Sunday’s 5/18 ABC UFL broadcast at Noon ET, featuring the DC Defenders and Arlington Renegades, averaged 973,000 viewers. The week prior, in the same timeslot on ABC, the UFL scored its second-most-watched game of the 2025 season, averaging 956,000 viewers with a peak viewership of 1.2 million.
The Renegades-Defenders game peaked at 1.3 million viewers from 2:45-3 pm ET.
The 973k average and 1.3 million peak make it the most watched UFL game of the 2025 season.
This past Sunday’s ABC UFL game ended dramatically and controversially. As DC’s 33-30 triumph ended on a fake spike interception with Arlington in field goal range, looking to force overtime. However, the dramatic conclusion was seen on ESPN2, as the game was switched over after crossing the 3 pm ET threshold into ABC’s NBA playoff pre-game coverage.
Thanks in large part to the UFL’s continued strong performance on ABC. The Week 8 three-game viewership average of 712,000 is the highest for the 2025 season.
Final Thoughts: The key to the UFL’s growth is its ability to attract mainstream sports fans to grow beyond a niche audience of diehard football fans who have embraced the concept of a spring pro league for the last six years since the Alliance of American Football showed up on the scene in 2019.
If the goal is to get casual fans to sample the UFL product, Week 8 was the showcase for that aim. The games were exciting and filled with spectacular plays, particularly on Saturday and Sunday, with a top-notch atmosphere in St. Louis and D.C. The UFL’s innovation in rules and technology and stellar broadcasts were also in their best form.
The controversy surrounding ABC’s switch-off and the league’s unique rules, like three-point conversion plays and an overtime shootout format, gave the UFL the most viral attention it has had this season.
The comments section on social media outlets gave many inside the UFL bubble a severe reality check. It was evident that the league is not on the radar of casual and mainstream sports followers despite its premium positioning on FOX and ABC. Many fans do not know that the UFL season is ongoing or still exists.
ABC’s contractual obligation to a ‘Big’ league like the NBA is part of a late UFL season trend. It’s evident where the UFL is in the pecking order with its partners and ultimately on the sporting landscape. As evidenced by last week’s report on UFL Newshub, the league’s top teams do not have their venues available for home-field playoff games.
To that end, the young league has announced the site of its conference championship games, which will be held the first weekend of June. Birmingham and St.Louis will host the games regardless of whether Michigan and DC win their regular-season conference crowns.
The erased lack of stakes in the UFL’s final two weekends, when the Panthers, Stallions, Battlehawks, and Defenders all square off, will affect the UFL’s ceiling in viewership in the last two weeks of the regular season.
One step forward, two steps back. It’s been that kind of journey for the UFL and spring pro football leagues, which continue trying to defy the odds and gain favor.
UFL Week 9 TV Schedule
FRI, MAY 23
SAT, MAY 24
MATCHUP | STATUS | LOCATION | ODDS | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
ARL | @ | MEM | 12:00 PM ABC | Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium,Memphis, TN | ARL -4.0 |
MICH | @ | BHM | 3:00 PM ABC | Protective Stadium,Birmingham, AL | MICH -1.5 |
SUN, MAY 25
3 Comments
by Frank Dux
Hard to believe a QB who averaged 9 yards passing per Quarter was involved in a “Thriller”. How Memphis won that game despite that performance…we will never know.
by Mike Mitchell
It was a wacky game with brutal passing stats but it was exciting. Tons of big plays on defense, in the run game and on special teams. The OT shootout was fun too. That’s why the ratings jumped so high.
by 4th&long
The UFL has changed how they advertise the weekly games from 2024 to 2025.
In 2024 they created a graphic used on social media prominently and similar on the main web site. It included date, time and network of game, for all 4 games in one graphic.
That doesn’t exists in 2025. Its hard enough getting viewers, can the league go back to this “easy to find/follow” weekly TV promotional advertisement?
Something needs to be done. Games on ABC should not be that much higher than Fox – in 2024 ABC beat Fox by 110k in reg season avg. This year so far its 240k. If its not a lack of network promotion than its the league.
They need to start making the Weekly game TV schedule easy to find and spread around. Earlier and simpler.