WWE and ESPN announced a new streaming deal that will kick in next year bringing the company’s premium live events to ESPN’s new platform that launched towards the end of the month. Below are some key points regarding the deal:

• The agreement is worth a reported $1.6 billion over 5 years ($325 million/year), a marked increase from what WWE was generating from NBCU’s Peacock service – approximately $180 million/year.
• The WWE-Peacock deal runs out in March of 2026, which would be when the WWE-ESPN deal kicks in, most likely with WrestleMania 42 being the first event to stream on the new platform.
• WWE President Nick Khan confirmed 10 premium live events over 12 nights (WrestleMania, SummerSlam are now two-nights) to air on ESPN while “select events” will also be simulcast on ESPN’s linear stations.
• The new ESPN service starts at $29.99/month or $300/year, which means fans in the United States will be paying more for PLE content.
• There was no mention of archived content moving to ESPN, which could open up a market for Netflix to swoop in to grab those rights.
• Internationally, Netflix will continue to stream all premium live events.
• WWE NXT PLEs are not factored into this deal, so TKO could negotiate with another media company to stream those domestically.
• There is some confusion if cable subscribers would get the new ESPN streaming service included in their packaging and available through authentication. So far only subscribers of Charter (Spectrum), DirecTV, FuboTV, Hulu Live TV, and Verizon Fios will automatically get it for free, but it is expected that subscribers of other services will end up also being included by the time the whole thing launches next year.