Difference Between WWE and WWF

WWE vs WWF

If you are a wrestling fan, you must have heard names of WWF and WWE. WWF stood for World Wrestling federation and WWE stands for World Wrestling Entertainment. Both are same and the only difference between the two is in their initials where E has been substituted for F. Before knowing how the name got changed we need to know about the background of WWF.

Vince McMahon, who is the owner and CEO of WWE today, founded WWF in 1982, changing the name of the erstwhile WWWF owned by his father. WWF was a purely entertainment company that focused on attracting audiences to see professional wrestlers in the arena. Vince began to organize fights between wrestlers on a grand scale and sold videotapes of these fights to various TV channels. Soon, he earned a lot with advertising and promotional activities and lured wrestlers that were fighting for competing bodies. He signed Hulk Hogan, who appeared in Rocky III and had a national recognition.

Vince introduced concepts like WWF World Tour and Wrestle Mania that caught the imagination of the people and soon WWF found its way into every home in America through cable television. Vince had to contend with the emergence of WCW in between which was formed to counter the popularity of WWF and was basically an association of disgruntled wrestlers who were furious with a pay cut introduced by Vince. However, WWF emerged unscathed and regained its popularity. Eventually, in 1999, WWF purchased WCW and ECW (Extreme Championship Wrestling) to reign supreme on national television as well as cable television all across the world.

It was in 2000 that WWF got embroiled in a controversy when World Wide Fund for Nature, an environmental agency sued Vince for using its initials. The lawsuit dragged in courts for years when Vince finally got bored and decided to change the name of the company from WWF to WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment). Everything else remains the same and only E replaces F in the whole drama.