Judging by ratings, Netflix’s first live broadcast of a boxing event headlined by influencer Jake Paul’s bout with boxing legend Mike Tyson was a success.
Data released over the weekend by Netflix said that 60 million households watched the Paul vs Tyson fight, while 50 million households tuned in for the co-main event of Serrano vs Taylor 2. Using a standard co-viewing multiplier of 1.2 (which could well be low given that live sports events are more likely to attract bigger crowds watching together through watch parties), total viewing would have sat at around 72 million individuals, more than half of this year’s Super Bowl’s US viewership.
But the fight was marred by reports of technical issues experienced by some users, who reported streaming failures over social media. ‘Unwatchable’ and ‘#NetflixCrash’ both trended on X during the event, with some high profile figures in the sports world including commentator Skip Bayless reporting that they themselves had struggled with buffering issues. Jake Paul himself in his victory speech announced “We crashed the site”.
Netflix hasn’t released a statement addressing the reports, and there’s no way to tell what proportion of the total audience might have experienced issues. But the streamer has had trouble with live streaming before. A live reunion for reality show Love is Blind last year experienced widespread problems, which were significant enough to draw an apology from Netflix.
Ad-ded Pressure
Netflix will hope it can get any infrastructure issues related to live streaming ironed out quickly. While the streamer doesn’t have much experience in live sports, and live streams as a whole have been fairly sporadic, they’re about to become a regular feature.
Another major one off is booked for December, as Netflix has streaming rights for two Christmas day NFL fixtures. Crucially, unlike the boxing broadcast, these will be ad supported streams – Netflix says it has sold out inventory across the two games – so any streaming interruptions could upset advertising partners. Last year’s Christmas day games recorded around 30 million viewers, so streaming volumes will likely be easier to handle than Friday’s fight, but Netflix will be keen to show to advertisers that it can be trusted with premium inventory next to major live sports.
Then starting in the new year, Netflix will show weekly episodes of pro wrestling business WWE’s flagship show Raw, as well as other WWE events in international markets. This too will be ad supported, meaning that again, the pressure will be on from advertising partners to deliver stable streams.
Netflix, for its part, seems confident. The streamer has announced that Beyoncé will perform a half time show during one of its Christmas day games, and that Travis Scott will appear at its first WWE Raw broadcast – two announcements designed to boost viewership across these events. Brands running ads alongside these broadcasts will hope that any teething problems are promptly fixed.
