Joe Rogan is staying with Spotify. The UFC color commentator has signed a new multiyear partnership with the streaming platform to carry The Joe Rogan Experience. The Wall Street Journal reported the deal is worth an estimated $250 million, and Bloody Elbow and MMA Junkie both reported the renewal on Thursday, Oct. 8.
Under the agreement, Spotify will keep handling ad sales and licensing for the show, which stays available across multiple services.
Rogan sounded like a man who had just seen the number. “The partnership with Spotify has been an amazing fit, and they’re incredible to work with,” he said in a statement. “I’m extremely happy and excited to continue with them for years to come.”
Spotify was every bit as pleased. Jordan Newman, the company’s head of content partnerships, said, “Joe has built something incredibly enduring,” and credited the show’s hold on a massive global audience to the fact that nothing else out there is like it. Newman also said, “Spotify’s podcast business has grown alongside ‘JRE’ over the years, and we’re excited to keep building on that partnership for years to come.”
The first contract between the two sides came in 2020 and was worth $100 million. Six years later, Bloody Elbow reported, the show is the most popular podcast on the planet. It beat every rival on Spotify, YouTube and Apple in 2025 and has 18 million followers on Spotify alone. Rogan launched the podcast in 2009, and plenty of MMA’s biggest names have sat across the table from him since then.
Fight fans online reacted the way fight fans react to any number with that many zeros. “No podcast is worth this lol,” one wrote. Another went with “Bro doing UFC commentary for the love of the game.” One fan said Rogan “needs to retire from UFC and just focus on his podcast,” and somebody else offered the simplest review: “Get that bag, Joe.”
The headline figure is two and a half times what Spotify paid in 2020. Nobody has disclosed the length of the new deal, so anyone on X posting Rogan’s annual salary is guessing. I’ve lost money backing confident guesses, so I’ll pass. What we do know is that Spotify is paying a bigger reported number for a show that lives on several platforms, which tells you the ad sales and licensing rights are what the company is buying. The money to pay for that comes from the 18 million Spotify followers and a 2025 in which the show beat every competitor on three platforms. As for the fan who wants him to quit the commentary booth, I’d fade that one hard. A guy who still shows up cageside with $250 million reportedly on the way is sitting there because he loves the job. I’d lay heavy juice that he’s back in the booth for the UFC’s next big pay-per-view, talking about somebody’s wrestling base like nothing happened.
