Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk are “absolutely dead serious” about fighting each other in a cage match, the boss of UFC has said.
The tech billionaires used their respective social media platforms, Instagram and Twitter, this week to talk up their battle-readiness – and both have apparently since spoken to mixed martial arts supremo Dana White.
Speaking to TMZ Live, the UFC promoter and president said a Zuckerberg vs Musk fight would even eclipse the revenue and viewership amassed by a 2017 boxing spectacle between Floyd Mayweather and Colin McGregor, which 50 million people watched in the US alone.
“There’s no limit on what this thing can make,” said White, who revealed he spoke to the pair “last night”.
“Both guys are absolutely dead serious about this.”
Musk, 51, appeared to light the fire under Zuckerberg’s belly by saying he was “up for a cage match if he is”.
He tweeted the challenge in response to a report that his rival’s Meta company is plotting its own take on Twitter, widely reported to be an Instagram spin-off called Threads.
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Zuckerberg, 39, posted a screenshot of Musk’s tweet on his Instagram story, with the caption “send me location”.
The SpaceX and Tesla chief executive then suggested the Vegas Octagon as the venue. It’s an eight-sided caged fighting arena used to host UFC bouts in Las Vegas.
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A Meta spokesman didn’t deny the fight could really happen, only saying he had “nothing to add”.
Zuckerberg will likely be confident if it goes ahead – he’s younger than Musk and trains with a jiu-jitsu team, while Musk has previously admitted he rarely works out “except for picking up my kids & throwing them in the air”.
The Meta owner shared photos of him winning medals at his first tournament earlier this year.