How much are UFC belts worth? About $300k apiece, according to one former champion

Now I understand why it took so long to send Demetrious Johnson ALL THE BELTS.

It also sheds some light on the new belt-gifting policy enacted by Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), which no longer awards champions a shiny new strap for every individual title defense after recently creating brand-new hardware.

Those things are expensive!

How expensive? About $300,000 apiece, according to former light heavyweight champion Rashad Evans, who spilled the beans to fellow ex-champion, Michael Bisping.

“Rashad Evans, former champion, has a belt at home,” Bisping said on his official podcast (via Fightful). “He was having a conversation with Dana White, Dana White told him that the old belts, the ones that we have are worth $300,000 each. That’s what Dana White told Rashad Evans.”

Evans captured the crown by taking out Forrest Griffin at UFC 92 back in Dec. 2008, then surrendered the strap to Lyoto Machida at UFC 98 the following May.

“Mine’s just been gathering dust back there,” Bisping said. “There’s another one in the other room just gathering dust, if I’d known they were worth $600,000 between them I might get them insured for one and then they get stolen ... I’m joking. I might at least put them in some kind of case and keep the dust off of them. Apparently Rashad Evans swears they’re worth $300,000 apiece. Which yeah, I was happy. That’s good to know.”

Bisping won the middleweight title by stopping Luke Rockhold at UFC 199, defended it against Dan Henderson at UFC 204, then handed it over to Georges St-Pierre at UFC 217.

Speaking of “Rush” ... he’s probably sitting on a pretty penny, all things considered.