Netflix has said that 60 million households worldwide had tuned in for the highly anticipated boxing match between Jake Paul and Mike Tyson, and the event peaked at 65 million streams, according to a company statement.
The bout between the 27-year-old social media influencer-turned-prize fighter Paul and the 58-year-old former heavyweight champion Tyson, which Paul won, was streamed live on Netflix.
A Reuters report, quoting a Netflix statement, said nearly 50 million households tuned in for the co-main event between Ireland’s lightweight champion Katie Taylor and Puerto Rico’s featherweight champion Amanda Serrano.
“The bout is likely to be the most watched professional women’s sporting event in US history,” Netflix said in its statement. The Paul-Tyson bout was held on Saturday and streamed live on Netflix.
There were some hiccups during the live-stream of the match, with over 90,000 users reporting problems on Netflix at its peak, according to outage tracking website Downdetector.
However, the streaming platform was back up on Saturday after the outage that lasted roughly 6 hours in the United States.
Meanwhile, the Netflix statement, accessed by Indianbroadcastingworld.com, added that Joe Hand Promotions, a leader in premium live sports and entertainment programming for the out-of-home market, also distributed last night’s event to over 6,000 bars and restaurants in the US, setting the record for commercial distribution of a combat sports event in the company’s 50+ year history.
PaulTyson was the No. 1 trending topic worldwide on X on Friday with #Serrano at No. 2 in the US, Brazil, Spain, and Canada. The fight dominated social conversation, accounting for 11 of the Top 11 trending topics in the US, the Netflix statement pointed out.
Netflix and Most Valuable Promotions made AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, the epicenter of boxing history on Saturday night as an astounding 72.3k total attendees gathered to witness the historic Paul vs. Tyson and Taylor vs. Serrano 2 fight card.
The fight attracted a star-studded ringside audience, including Evander Holyfield, Shaquille O’Neal, Sugar Ray Leonard, Jerry Jones, Charlize Theron, Ralph Macchio, William Zabka, Josh Duhamel, Joe Jonas, Joe Manganiello, Lennox Lewis, Rob Gronkowski, Mike Epps, Simu Liu, Daddy Yankee, Jay Shetty, Anderson Silva, Tom Segura, Jeff Ross, Joey Fatone, Tori Kelly, Micah Parsons, Brandin Cooks, Trevon Diggs, Michael Irvin, Jason Witten, Cedric the Entertainer, Hasan Minhaj, Mark Davis, Bryson DeChambeau, Omari Hardwick, Darren Barnet, Jonathan Daviss and Carlacia Grant, apart from others.