Royal Rumble (2013)

Royal Rumble
Promotional poster featuring The Rock
Promotion	WWE
Date	January 27, 2013
City	Phoenix, Arizona
Venue	US Airways Center
Attendance	15,103[1]
Buy rate	512,000
Tagline(s)	Finally...
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Royal Rumble chronology
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The 2013 Royal Rumble was the 26th annual Royal Rumble professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by WWE. It took place on January 27, 2013, at the US Airways Center in Phoenix, Arizona. As has been customary since 1993, the Royal Rumble match winner received a world championship match at that year's WrestleMania. For the 2013 event, the winner received their choice to challenge for either the WWE Championship or World Heavyweight Championship at WrestleMania 29. It was the last Royal Rumble to feature the World Heavyweight Championship, which was unified with the WWE Championship in December; subsequently, this was the last Royal Rumble to include two eligible championships for the Royal Rumble winner until the 2017 event.

Five matches were contested at the event, including one on the Pre-Show. In the main event, The Rock defeated CM Punk to win the WWE Championship, which was his first championship since 2002 that also ended Punk's reign at 434 days. On the undercard, John Cena won the 2013 Royal Rumble match, making him the fourth multiple Royal Rumble winner. In another prominent match, Antonio Cesaro defeated The Miz to retain his United States Championship.