Netflix declares Mike Tyson vs Jake Paul bout livestream a success amid viewer complaints

has issued a statement in response to widespread complaints about the quality of Friday’s livestream.

This unprecedented scale created many technical challenges, which the launch team tackled brilliantly by prioritizing stability of the stream for the majority of viewers.

Mike Tyson, despite losing to Jake Paul, expressed gratitude for overcoming health challenges where he almost died earlier this year to fight before his children and viewed showing up as a personal victory.

«I’m sure many of you have seen the chatter in the press and on social media about the quality issues,» Netflix CTO wrote to employees, as reported by Bloomberg.

Fans on both sides of the Atlantic faced poor image quality, prolonged buffering and spotty audio throughout Friday’s undercard. Hundreds online complained of error messages, while ‘#unwatchable’ began trending on X. And according to Downdetector, which tracks online outages, more than 80,000 customers were experiencing issues by 10:35pm New York time on Friday.

Despite this, Netflix sees the event as a success after claiming as many as 65 million households were viewing at one point.

The victory is the 11th of Paul's 12-fight career with his only defeat coming against boxer and Love Island star Tommy Fury

«We don’t want to dismiss the poor experience of some members, and know we have room for improvement, but still consider this event a huge success,» Stone added.

The streaming issues will remain a topic of interest with Netflix scheduled to stream an NFL doubleheader on Christmas Day. You Tuber Paul beat the ‘Baddest man on the planet’ Tyson by unanimous point decision after the former world heavyweight champion returned to the ring 19 years after retirement.