UFC 257 will mark the long-awaited return of Conor McGregor to the octagon and excitement amongst UFC fans has reached a fever pitch. Unfortunately, as the pay per view event got started at 10 PM ET tonight, ESPN+ suffered some technical issues and a lot of fans are unable to watch.
UPDATE 1/25/2021:
- A spokesperson for ESPN and Disney (who owns ESPN) has said they are “aware that a technical issue prevented a portion of users from accessing the early part of the ESPN+ pay-per-view event, and we apologize for that experience. We worked as quickly as possible to identify and resolve the issue.”
- According to The Verge, ESPN Plus will issue partial refunds to customers who paid for the UFC pay-per-view event Saturday only to run into technical problems.
- While the cause of the issue was never specified, it allegedly affected users in the Western US, and was resolved by 11PM ET, allegedly in time to see the signature fights. Some users were affected for a few minutes while others went without for more than an hour.
- Viewers who paid for the fight through a third-party platform like Apple, Roku, Google, or Amazon, will need to seek refunds from the platform, but ESPN (and Disney) says it will work with those providers on the refund process.
What’s Happening:
- With UFC 257 set to be one of the most purchase pay per view events for the UFC in some time, ESPN+ suffered technical difficulties, leaving many fans unable to watch the fights.
- Many fans took to twitter to voice their displeasure with the situation.
- At the time of this writing, it appears ESPN+ has begun working for some fans while others are still unable to watch, now an hour and a half into the event.