UFC 324 start time expected to serve as permanent change under Paramount deal

The UFC officially launches its broadcast partnership with Paramount on Jan. 24 and with that comes a new start time for the major numbered events.

As part of the announcement for UFC 324, which takes place at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, also came news that the main card would kick off at 9 p.m. ET/6 p.m. PT. That’s one hour earlier than the current start times for the pay-per-view main cards at 10 p.m. ET/7 p.m. PT — outside of a few special events like those happening in Abu Dhabi, which typically start in the morning to afternoon in the United States.

Now it appears that this change is permanent with officials confirming to MMA Fighting that the new start time expected to serve as the standard for all major numbered events moving forward.

This actually happened once in the past with the UFC experimenting with an earlier start time for the pay-per-view cards several years ago but it was short lived with the promotion eventually returning to the regular 10 p.m. ET launch.

That’s not the case any longer with the UFC airing events on Paramount+ starting in January with all of the events coming under the standard subscription price for the streaming service as the promotion moves away from the traditional pay-per-view model.

While all UFC events are airing on Paramount+, there are times when some cards could also air on CBS, although that’s not expected for the launch with UFC 324 in January.

The UFC holds its final event with ESPN on Dec. 13 with a card taking place at the UFC APEX and the next event isn’t scheduled until UFC 324 on Jan. 24. The next scheduled event happens just one week later with UFC 325 from Australia so the full UFC schedule for 2025 — including the standard Fight Night events — isn’t set yet.

UFC 324 is headlined by an interim lightweight title fight as Justin Gaethje takes on Paddy Pimblett in the main event with Kayla Harrison defending her bantamweight title against Amanda Nunes in the co-main event. At UFC 325, featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski returns to action to face Diego Lopes in a rematch after Volkanovski won their previous encounter by unanimous decision.