How is UFC Scored – UFC Scoring

By WherestheMatch Team

In an ideal world, every UFC fight would culminate in a showstopping knockout or a flawlessly executed submission. Unfortunately, not every fight is a classic and plenty end with both fighters standing after the allocated time, at which point the victor is decided via the judge’s scorecards. Combat sports such as UFC can be challenging to properly score, especially between fighters who are relatively evenly matched or have heavily contrasting styles. To try and ease the controversy around judging decisions, the UFC makes use of the 10-point-must system which culminates the opinions of three ring-side judges to try and give an accurate representation of which fighter edged out the other.

When Does a Fight Go to Decision?

In simple terms, a fight goes to decision when all of the pre-agreed rounds have been completed without the referee calling a stoppage. There are several reasons as to why a referee might stop a fight with the main reasons being knockouts, tap outs, doctors’ advice, or suspicion of concussion/other serious injury.  

How Are UFC Fights Scored?

For every round fought, the judges will provide the fighter with a score depending on their dominance. Come the end of the allocated number of rounds, these numbers are tallied up to give a combined figure; the fighter with the higher total wins the fight – simple, right?

As a part of the 10-point-must system, the fighter who was dominant in the round gets the maximum score of 10 points – this indicates that they won the round overall. For the opponent, they are also graded based on their performance with their being given a number that represents the dominance of the opposing fighter. Most commonly this will be a 9 if the round was relatively close, an 8 if there was clear dominance from a fighter which led to significant damage to the opponent, or in very rare instances a 7 if a fighter completely overwhelms the other.

There have only been a small number of occasions in which a judge has given a fighter a 7. The most common round scoreline by far is a 10-9 but you may also see the occasional 10-8. It’s also worth noting that a 10-10 can be given as a round score, but this is not only incredibly rare, but is also frowned upon by the UFC themselves. Only in instances where there is absolutely nothing to differentiate the two fighters might this be given as a score.

The Types of Decision Outcomes

Before the winner of a bout is announced, the commentator first informs viewers as to the decision the judges have come to. You may be accustomed to hearing the words ‘unanimous decision’, ‘majority decision’, or ‘split decision’, but what do these terms actually mean?

• Unanimous Decision – The simplest outcome, all three judges agree that Fighter A is the more dominant.
• Majority Decision – Two of the judges have allocated the win to Fighter A, and the third has graded it as a draw.
• Split Decision – In instances when the fight is very close, two of the judges have given the win to Fighter A while the final judge scored the win for Fighter B.
• Unanimous Draw – All of the judges have scored the bout as a draw.
• Majority Draw – A very rare occurrence, two judges have scored a draw while the third gave the win to Fighter A. The majority went draw so the fight ends as a draw.
• Split Draw – One judge scored the win for fighter A, one scored the win for Fighter B, and the third scored a draw.
• Technical Decision – When a fight has to be stopped due to an unintentional illegal shot, the fight is judged based on the points collated up to that point. A technical decision then becomes one of the aforementioned unless it’s a draw, at which point it becomes a technical draw instead.

The Impact of Fouls on Scoring

There are various illegal moves in the UFC and hitting an opponent with a throat strike, heat-butt, eye gouge, groin attack, or a variety of other moves will see you get a point deduction. It’s up to the referee as to how harshly these are punished and most fighters get off with a warning for first offences but will get points docked if this happens repeatedly or its clear that this is intentional. With how the scoring works in the 10-point-must system, a point deduction can be especially harmful in fights where the scoreline is pretty close to begin with.

How Does a Fighter Win a Round?

Dominance is the key word when talking about a fighter winning a round, but what actually constitutes a dominant performance? It usually comes down to several factors. Firstly, effective striking and grappling is the most important facet – who is managing more strikes? Who is successfully pulling off the takedowns? Then you’ve got aggression. Is one of the fighters visibly more active in the contest? You would gauge this by seeing which of the two is throwing more punches, actively moving forward, or just generally trying to finish the fight. Finally, if there isn’t anything to differentiate the fighters in striking, grappling, or aggression, the judges may use octagon control to decide the winner of the round. In most contests, you’ll have one fighter who is in a more favourable position is highlighted as the centre of the cage. The fighter who is often closer to the cage is judged to be on the back foot. By taking all of these into account, the judging panel decides the victor of a round.

While the UFC’s 10-point-must score system has earned some criticism over recent years, it looks to remain a mainstay within MMA’s leading competition. Several alternatives have been suggested by the community but there doesn’t look to be any traction in regards to getting this changed.