YouTube/Logan Paul
Logan Paul.
- Business Insider has calculated that YouTubers KSI and Logan Paul made as much as $11 million from their boxing match on Saturday.
- Media estimates suggest around 20,000 fans attended the match, and more than 770,000 paid to watch the live stream on YouTube.
- The pair will have made even more cash from a uCast stream of the fight, as well as merchandise sales, and ad revenue from videos in the run-up to the fight.
- They will be able to double their money next February, when they plan a rematch in the US.
The boxing match between YouTubers KSI and Logan Paul may have resulted in a draw, but the event was doubtless a win for their bank balances.
According to The Times, almost 20,000 fans attended the boxing match at Manchester Arena on Saturday night. And The Verge calculated that around 773,000 people watched the £7.50/$10 pay-per-view stream cumulatively on YouTube.
Business Insider estimates that this tots up to as much as £8.3 million, or $11 million, in revenue. Here's how we got there:
REUTERS/Tom Jacobs
Logan Paul in action against KSI at the Manchester Arena.
With an average ticket price of £135, and rounding up the number of attendees to 20,000, we generously estimated that the live event pulled in £2.7 million ($3.5 million).
And if 773,000 people paid £7.50 or $10 each to watch the livestream on YouTube, that brought in £5.6 million, or $7.7 million.
That gives us a total figure of £8.3 million or a little over $11 million.
We should emphasise that this is pretty approximate. The average ticket price figure is skewed higher by the smaller number of £495 VIP tickets sold to die-hard fans.
And our total excludes revenue from ads against YouTube videos in the run-up to the fight, money from merchandise sales, and any revenue from the uCast stream, available to those who were unable to access YouTube. All of these will have brought in more cash.
It also doesn't mean KSI and Logan Paul have necessarily walked away with $5.5 million each. Our calculations exclude any overheads for staging the event, including travel and staff costs.
The pair also lost out on substantial amounts of money. The Verge reported that more than 1 million viewers watched illegal, pirated streams on game streaming site Twitch. That's a potential loss of £7.5 million or $10 million in streaming revenue alone.
It's a substantial wad of cash for two internet celebrities who are not professional boxers, and is comparable to a professional boxing match. According to The Mirror, the 2017 fight in Wembley between Anthony Joshua and Wladimir Klitschko generated £8 million in ticket sales.
KSI and Logan Paul will have the chance to double their money in February, when they fight again at an unconfirmed venue in the US.