Royal Rumble (2013) was the twenty-sixth annual Royal Rumble professional wrestling pay-per-view event produced by WWE. It took place on January 27, 2013 at the US Airways Center in Phoenix, Arizona. It was the first WWE pay-per-view of 2013, and featured John Cena winning the traditional Royal Rumble match. In the main event, The Rock defeated CM Punk for the WWE Championship, recapturing the title for the first time since 2002, and ending Punk's long reign at 434 days.

The professional wrestling matches at Royal Rumble featured professional wrestlers performing as characters in scripted events pre-determined by the hosting promotion, WWE. Storylines between the characters played out on WWE's primary television programs, Raw and SmackDown.

On July 23, 2012, during Raw 1000, The Rock announced that he'd challenge CM Punk for the WWE Championship at the Royal Rumble. Later that night, Punk, Daniel Bryan, and John Cena each stated that they'd face The Rock as defending champion; later that night, Punk turned heel, attacking and laying out The Rock. Punk defended the championship for the rest of the year, while on December 23, 2012, The Rock tweeted to Punk that he was ready for the Royal Rumble. On the January 7 episode of Raw, Punk retained the WWE Championship against Ryback in a Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match after The Shield interfered. They also during Punk's defence against Ryback and John Cena back at Survivor Series; this win secured Punk as the one who would defend against The Rock. On the January 21 episode of Raw while speaking about beating Punk at the Rumble, The Shield assaulted The Rock. After the assault, WWE Chairman Vince McMahon announced that if The Shield interfered in the match, Punk will be stripped of his title.

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