Tai Tuivasa is back in the Octagon after an 18-month layoff, and he’s hoping to snap a five-fight losing streak.
The former title challenger last appeared in August 2024, when he dropped a split decision to Jairzinho Rozenstruik.
Now he is set to face Tallison Teixeira, a towering 6ft 7in knockout artist, at the Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney.
Tai Tuivasa drops 65 pounds ahead of UFC 325 return
Tai Tuivasa hit 330lbs during his time away from the sport, but he has made a significant cut to get back within the limits.
On Friday, he weighed in at 265.5lbs, half a pound under the maximum allowed for heavyweights, though it looked like it took some effort to get there.
But rather than celebrating his weight drop, some fans took aim at how he appeared on the scales.
“Bro looks so drained cutting to heavyweight,” one fan published.
“I hope this isn’t real, he looks awful. Why is there so little muscle?” read another comment.
“The hardest cut in UFC history,” someone else wrote.
Another X user said: “Gonna rehydrate back to 300.”
One disappointed fan admitted: “Yeah, he ain’t looking great, man,” while a sixth person insisted: “This guy’s getting KO’d.”
UFC 325 weigh-in recap
UFC 325 saw a late change after an attempted scale trick led to a fight being cancelled.
Aaron Tau was set to meet Namsrai Batbayar in the finals of Road to UFC, which also served as an early prelim for the Sydney event.
The 32-year-old Kiwi, aiming to hit the mark, leaned heavily on the privacy curtain, meant for naked weigh-ins.
By putting too much weight through his elbows, he ended up well below the target, and had to step back onto the scale.
Tau’s weight eventually settled at 129lbs, resulting in his bout with Batbayar being cancelled from the second card of 2026.
- Alexander Volkanovski (145) vs. Diego Lopes (145) – for featherweight title
- Dan Hooker (155) vs. Benoit Saint Denis (155.75)
- Rafael Fiziev (155.5) vs. Mauricio Ruffy (155.25)
- Tallison Teixeira (259) vs. Tai Tuivasa (265.5)
- Jamie Mullarkey (155.5) vs. Quillan Salkilld (155.5)
- Billy Elekana (204) vs. Junior Tafa (205.25)
- Cody Brundage (184.75) vs. Cam Rowston (184.5)
- Torrez Finney (185.75) vs. Jacob Malkoun (185.75)
- Oban Elliott (169.75) vs. Jonathan Micallef (170.25)
- Kaan Ofli (145.25) vs. Yi Zha (145.5)
- Dom Mar Fan (154.75) vs. Sung Wook Kim (155.75) – Road to UFC lightweight final
- Keiichiro Nakamura (145.25) vs. Sebastian Szalay (145.75) – Road to UFC featherweight final
- Lawrence Lui (135.25) vs. Sulang Rangbo (135.75) – Road to UFC bantamweight final
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