Royal Rumble (2026)

"Royal Rumble: Saudi Arabia" redirects here. For the April 2018 Royal Rumble in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, see Greatest Royal Rumble.

The 2026 Royal Rumble, also promoted as Royal Rumble: Riyadh, is an upcoming professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) and livestreaming event produced by the American company WWE. It will be the 39th annual Royal Rumble and will take place in January 2026 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, as part of Riyadh Season, and will be held for wrestlers from the Raw and SmackDown brand divisions. This will be the first traditional Royal Rumble to take place outside of North America, the 14th event WWE will hold in Saudi Arabia as part of its 10-year partnership in support of Saudi Vision 2030, the second to feature a Royal Rumble match after Greatest Royal Rumble in April 2018, and the first of WWE's "Big Five" events to take place in the country.

Royal Rumble
Promotion	WWE
Brand(s)	Raw SmackDown
Date	January 2026
City	Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
WWE event chronology
← Previous Saturday Night's Main Event XLII Next → —
Royal Rumble chronology
← Previous 2025 Next → —
WWE in Saudi Arabia chronology
← Previous Night of Champions Next → —

The event is based around the Royal Rumble match, and the winner traditionally receives a world championship match at that year's WrestleMania. For the 2026 event, the men's and women's winners receive a choice of which championship to challenge for at WrestleMania 42 in Paradise, Nevada. The men's winner can choose to challenge for either Raw's World Heavyweight Championship or SmackDown's Undisputed WWE Championship, while the women have the choice between Raw's Women's World Championship and SmackDown's WWE Women's Championship.

Production

Background

For the first time in Royal Rumble's history, the event will be held outside of North America, as it will be held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

The Royal Rumble is an annual professional wrestling event that is traditionally held in January by the American company WWE since 1988. It is one of the promotion's five biggest events of the year, along with WrestleMania, SummerSlam, Survivor Series, and Money in the Bank, referred to as the "Big Five".^[1][2] The concept of the event is based around the Royal Rumble match, a modified battle royal in which the participants enter at timed intervals instead of all beginning in the ring at the same time.^[3][4]

From 1988 up through the 2025 event, the Royal Rumble was held annually in North America, with the inaugural 1988 event in Canada and the rest in the United States. In early 2018, WWE began a 10-year strategic multiplatform partnership with the Ministry of Sport (formerly General Sports Authority) in support of Saudi Vision 2030, Saudi Arabia's social and economic reform program. The first event in this partnership was the one-off Greatest Royal Rumble, which featured a 50-man Royal Rumble match.^[5][6] In May 2024, the chairman of Saudi Arabia's General Entertainment Authority, Turki Alalshikh, announced that the country was in talks with WWE to bring either the Royal Rumble or WrestleMania to the country in 2026 or 2027.^[7] On January 3, 2025, PWInsider reported that WWE would be holding the 2026 Royal Rumble in Saudi Arabia, with Fightful later confirming an official announcement would come during the Raw premiere on Netflix.^[8]

Ahead of the Netflix debut, WWE officially confirmed that the 39th Royal Rumble, and 14th event in the Saudi Arabian partnership, would be happening in Riyadh in January 2026 as part of Riyadh Season, which previously hosted Crown Jewel; the 2025 Crown Jewel was moved to Perth, Australia as a result. With the 2026 Royal Rumble in Saudi Arabia, the 2026 calendar year will host three events in the country instead of two, as 2025 only had one. This also returns the Royal Rumble to its traditional January slot as the 2025 event was held in February. The event will feature wrestlers from the Raw and SmackDown brands.^[9] In addition to airing on traditional pay-per-view worldwide, it will be available to livestream on ESPN's direct-to-consumer streaming service in the United States, Netflix in most international markets, and the WWE Network in any remaining countries that have not yet transferred to Netflix due to pre-existing contracts. This will be the first Royal Rumble to livestream on ESPN as their contract, which was assumed to begin with WrestleMania 42, will begin with Wrestlepalooza in September 2025 after Peacock's per-event contract expires at the conclusion of Clash in Paris.^[10][11]

The Royal Rumble match generally features 30 wrestlers and the winner traditionally earns a world championship match at that year's WrestleMania. For 2026, the men and women can choose which world championship to challenge for at WrestleMania 42; the men can choose Raw's World Heavyweight Championship or SmackDown's Undisputed WWE Championship, while the women have the choice between Raw's Women's World Championship and SmackDown's WWE Women's Championship.^[3][4]

Storylines

The event will include matches that result from scripted storylines. Results are predetermined by WWE's writers on the Raw and SmackDown brands,^[12][13] while storylines are produced on WWE's weekly television shows, Monday Night Raw and Friday Night SmackDown.^[14]