WWE hosted its much-awaited premium live event the Royal Rumble this past Sunday. The show was filled with spectacular matches and spots which kept the audience glued to their TV sets till the end.
The show witnessed the return of Cody Rhodes who went on to win the men’s rumble match. Rhea Ripley emerged as the winner of the women’s rumble match by eliminating Liv Morgan with a scintillating move. The match between Roman Reigns and Kevin Owens and the events that followed clearly portrayed the art of storytelling. Apart from that the event also hosted the first-ever pitch-black match between Bray Wyatt and LA Knight.
WWE released this report indicating the overall success of the show that broke records. Here is what it read:
STAMFORD, Conn., January 30, 2023 – WWE® (NYSE: WWE) today announced that the 2023 Royal Rumble, which emanated from the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas, became WWE’s highest-grossing and most-viewed Royal Rumble in company history.
The event set a new all-time gate record at more than $7.7 million, far surpassing the previous Royal Rumble high in 2017 by more than 50 percent. Viewership of the event saw a 52 percent increase versus the previous record set in 2022.
In addition, the 2023 Royal Rumble broke all-time venue merchandise and sponsorship records. Merchandise sales were up 135 percent versus the record set in 2022. Royal Rumble sponsorship revenue was up nearly 200 percent versus 2022 and featured the first-ever sponsored match (MTN DEW PITCH BLACK) and sponsored countdown clock (Applebee’s).
On social, the Roman Reigns-Sami Zayn videos generated 20 million-plus views across all WWE platforms and became the most-viewed WWE clip of 2023. Additional highlights include Logan Paul and Ricochet’s high-flying collision which amassed 26.5 million views across WWE and Paul’s platforms, and the launch of Reigns’ TikTok account which netted 100K followers in the first 24 hours.
