UFC 318 Payouts: How Much are Dustin Poirier and Max Holloway Earning for BMF Title Fight?

Give or take a few more hours, veteran Dustin Poirier will have his last dance at the Smoothie King Center in New Orleans. His retirement bout comes in the form of BMF Champ Max Holloway atop the UFC 318 PPV event. Both brawlers are expected to bank championship payouts and handsome fight purses/post-fight perks for the visceral brawl about to unfold.

Their first encounter was in February 2012, with Poirier emerging victorious via first-round submission in a featherweight bout at UFC 143. The two fighters ran it back again in 2019 for the interim UFC 155-pound championship at UFC 236. The duo went the distance on that one.

UFC’s 8th PPV offering this year has Dustin Poirier saving his last dance in front of a home crowd – the Louisiana faithful. Six years later, Poirier, 36, and Holloway, 33, will do the same routine, but this time with bigger stakes. Their payout, PPV sale output, and post-fight incentives would naturally reflect the effort afterward.

Salaries of the highest-profile UFC fighters are no longer published in detail by UFC and athletic commissions, but a brief overview of what they can make at UFC 318 is provided here. This is Poirier’s last bankable five-round affair as a UFC fighter. The figures are purely based on their previous performances and paydays so far.

Salary of Dustin Poirier at UFC 318

‘The Diamond’ has had a true exemplary run that started way back in the pre-Zuffa LLC bygone era at WEC 50; the fighter earned a measly $3,000 base salary/$10k in sponsorship. Slow and steady wins the race, and Poirier began his gradual ascent with a debut at UFC 125 ($4,000 base salary bracket).

A product of Team Gladiators Academy back then, Poirier entered the 6-fight $10,000 bracket and signing-setup soon. His base increased to $12,000 in his 4th fight, when he met ‘Blessed’ for the first time; it was only one way up from there.

‘The Diamond’ bagged a pack of $17,000 base bracket/ $17,000 in win bonus, along with a stout $20,000 sponsorship deal after the TUF: 16 finale. Bouncing around a while, he found his home with American Top Team, and the prolific striker moved to a $20k base bracket at his UFC on Fuel TV: Barao vs McDonald scrap vs. Cub Swanson.

Then, a rising prospect, in his first and only loss in the Conor McGregor trilogy, he was earning a payday of $34,000 base salary ($34,000 bonus if he won) and $50k in sponsorship money. His $60,000 and $50k post-fight performance perk (vs. Jim Miller) increased to a $65,000 bracket against Eddie Alvarez.

He stuck to it and made $1,000,000/$1,500,000 base pay against “The Notorious” the next two times ($5,121,000 all-in!). Even in his loss against Charles Oliveira, Poirier made 550,000 PPV buys, punctuating a PPV sale of around $500,000. The Louisiana fighter was now into the Venum multi-year sponsorship deal, moving on from his Zuffa-era WEC fight (January 2007 and onward) pay.

Hence, the standard sponsorship was now $21,000. This time, he made in an all-time classic war with Michael Chandler, preceded by a $1,000,000 base bracket, PPV buys sitting around 600,000 ($600,000 sales) and a ginormous $50,000 bonus. Per BetGM, Poirier made around $1,796,000 after his UFC 299 victory.

Per Forbes, he earned a $1,000,000 ($1,282,000 all-in) base salary, with (est.) $200,000 in PPV sales, and also banked $32,000 in compliance (sponsorship) pay to enter as a title challenger at UFC 302. However, he failed a third title bid to Islam Makhachev via fifth-round submission. Per projections, Dustin Poirier’s UFC 318 PPV payout is entitled to a base pay of up to $1.6 million this week.

Salary of Max Holloway at UFC 318

When he started off against the Louisiana native, Max Holloway made merely $6,000 in base, along with a startup $10k in sponsorship pay. When he fought McGregor in their UFC Fight Night scrapper, it increased to $14,000. Per MMASalaries, he entered the $20,000 base salary fold vs. Clay Collard as early as 2014 (UFC Fight Night: Henderson vs dos Anjos).

In his first run at Jose Aldo, he reached a sturdy $160,000 base/ $160,000 in win-bonus; all over, though, he failed to earn his keep of the 167,000 PPV buys despite a win. However, he earned $40,000 in sponsorship pay, both times against Aldo.

Now well into the big boys’ league, he made a $350,000 base/ (est.) $560,000 in PPV buyout ($1,050,000 all-in) against Brian Ortega in their classic barnburner. While 0-3 in the count, the Hawaiian star jumped from $250,000 to $500,000 in his trilogy against Aussie legend Alexander Volkanovski.

Late last summer’s UFC 300 PPV card was a whole different situation with the birthing of what was a series of thematic bonus pays. Max Holloway etched his name in history with a buzzer-beater highlight reel. It amounted to $500,000 in base/$1,600,000 PPV buyout, with a gigantic theme bonus of $300,000 instead of $50k. He took home somewhere around $2,421,000 (all-in).

After a harsh cut down to 145 pounds, he failed a bid against Ilia Topuria – but he made $1,500,000 ($2,432,000 all-in) in the process. Under the Promotional Guidelines Compliance program’s payout tiers, he also snagged $32,000 sponsorship pay to enter as a title challenger. As for his UFC 318 payout, Holloway will expectedly make around $ 2.6 – 2.7 million. That’ll only increase if he retains his silver as a champion.

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