The National Football League (NFL) was the most watched sports league in the United States in 2023. Viewers watched a combined 974.7 billion minutes of football action across the 284 televised games between November 2022 and November 2023. Meanwhile, Major League Baseball (MLB) ranked second with a little less than 330 billion combined minutes from viewers.
How much does a Super Bowl ad cost?
The price of running an ad during the Super Bowl has tripled over the past two decades. In 2024, advertisers paid an average of seven million U.S. dollars to air a 30-second commercial during the Super Bowl LVI broadcast. The renowned sporting event is highly anticipated each year and is watched by millions around the world. In the U.S., the 2024 edition of the Super Bowl was watched by over 123 million Americans.
How many people watch the World Series?
Unlike the Super Bowl, MLB World Series TV viewership experienced an overall decrease over the past two decades. The games of the 2023 World Series, in which the Texas Rangers achieved a five-game series win over the Arizona Diamondbacks, were watched by around nine million viewers. This shows a considerable drop from the previous year, when nearly 12 million people tuned in to see the Houston Astros win the Commissioner’s Trophy.
The 2024 US Open women's final, which saw Aryna Sabalenka win her third Grand Slam, drew around 1.62 million TV viewers in the United States. Since ESPN took over as the official broadcaster of the competition in the U.S. in 2015, viewership has been generally lower than when CBS was the broadcaster. Since 2010, the largest TV audience of a US Open women's final came in 2013, when Serena Williams beat Victoria Azarenka.
As of January 2024, professional football was the most popular men's live sport in the United States, with ** percent of people watching it. Professional basketball came second with ** percent of viewers. By contrast, college football and basketball drew ** and ** percent of viewers, respectively.
There are widely considered to be four major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada - NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL. The professional soccer league (MLS) and the Women's NBA have also achieved popularity in the United States in recent years. During a 2024 survey, 34 percent of respondents stated that they were avid fans of the National Football League, NFL.
Sponsorship revenue for the major sports leagues in the United States reaches into the millions of U.S. dollars every year. In the 2022 season, sponsorship revenue in the National Football League (NFL) stood at 1.88 billion U.S. dollars. The largest sponsorship category within the league was technology, followed by betting, lottery and gaming.
Attendance at National Football League games
The National Football League is the highest division of professional American Football in the United States. With 32 teams competing annually with the hopes of advancing to and winning the Super Bowl championship game, the league attracts millions of fans from across the country each year. Comparing the average per game attendance of the four major sports league in North America, the NFL attracted close to 70 thousand fans per game on average, ranking it higher than Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association, and the National Hockey League in the 2022/23 season. Overall, the Dallas Cowboys welcomed the most attendees in the NFL on average in 2022.
Fantasy sports in the U.S.
One way for fans to engage with their favorite professional athletes is through fantasy sports, which involves the creation of a virtual team that tracks the performance of players and enables users to accumulate points after each game week. In 2022, the fantasy sports industry in the United States was worth an estimated 9.48 billion U.S. dollars. According to an August 2022 survey, ESPN’s platform ESPN Fantasy Sports was the most popular to use amongst fantasy football players in the United States. The survey also revealed some of the most important features of fantasy football platforms for users from the United States, with platform simplicity being very important for almost two thirds of respondents.
A 2022 survey revealed that over half of the population in the United States were interested in American football, making it the most popular sport in the country. Meanwhile, around ** percent of respondents in the survey were fans of baseball.
During a 2022 survey of members of Gen Z aged between 13 and 25 in the United States, 53 percent identified themselves as either casual or avid NFL fans. Meanwhile, one fifth of Gen Z respondents were fans of Formula 1.
We asked U.S. consumers about "Most popular sports activities" and found that ************ takes the top spot, while **************** is at the other end of the ranking.These results are based on a representative online survey conducted in 2025 among 25,537 consumers in the United States.
We asked U.S. consumers about "Interest in sport types" and found that ******************* takes the top spot, while ********** is at the other end of the ranking.These results are based on a representative online survey conducted in 2025 among 19,689 consumers in the United States.
During a February 2022 survey in the United States, almost half of respondents stated that they were fans of the National Football League. Meanwhile, ** percent of respondents claimed to be occasional fans of NASCAR.
This statistic provides information on the number of TV viewers of major sporting events in 2017 in the United States and their ratings, sorted by sport. According to the source, the most viewed sporting event of 2017 was Super Bowl 51, which drew in over ***** million viewers in the United States.
As of January 2024, the Olympic events were the most popular women's sports in the United States, with ** percent of people watching it, respectively. Tennis and professional basketball followed, both drawing ** percent of viewers, respectively.
The average regular-season home game attendance in the National Football League (NFL) during the 2022-23 season stood at almost ** thousand fans. This made it the highest attended professional sports league in North America. By contrast, the average home game attendance in the National Hockey League (NHL) during the 2022-23 season stood at just under ** thousand. The NFL is a professional football league in the United States that was founded in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association. Which NFL team has the highest average home game attendance? In 2022, the Dallas Cowboys recorded an average home attendance of ****** spectators, making them the NFL team with the highest average regular season attendance. This figure represents the average number of fans who attended each game held at the team's home stadium during the regular season. While this number is only an average, it provides a good indication of the overall level of support the team received from its fans. What is the most watched women’s soccer game of all time? As of May 2023, the highest-attended women's soccer game of all time was Barcelona's home match against Wolfsburg in April 2022. Barcelona’s home semi-final victory against Wolfsburg was watched by a crowd of ****** fans, which broke the record set only two months earlier when the women's Clásico drew a crowd of ******. Barcelona’s match against Wolfsburg represented the highest-ever attendance for a Women’s Champions League game and, indeed, a women’s soccer game.
This statistic provides information on the number of TV viewers of major sporting events in the United States and their ratings. According to the source, the most viewed sporting event in 2015 was Super Bowl 49, which drew in over *** million viewers in the United States.
In the U.S., sports content is still the most popular on traditional TV, with around ** percent of the viewing time happening via cable, satellite, and over-the-air TV in the second quarter of 2024. However, with more and more consumers opting for streaming options, the time spent watching sporting events on providers, such as Prime Video and ESPN+ is increasing.
There are widely considered to be four major professional men's sports leagues in the United States and Canada - NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL. The professional soccer league (MLS) has also achieved some popularity in the United States in recent years. During a 2019 survey, 27 percent of respondents aged 18 to 29 stated that the National Football League, NFL, was their favorite men's U.S. professional sports league to follow.
There are widely considered to be four major professional men's sports leagues in the United States and Canada - NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL. The professional soccer league (MLS) has also achieved some popularity in the United States in recent years. During a 2019 survey, 27 percent of Hispanic respondents stated that the National Football League, NFL, was their favorite men's U.S. professional sports league to follow.
In a September 2024 survey, almost **** of respondents stated that they did not attend a sport game or match in the past year. Meanwhile, ** percent of respondents attended a professional baseball (MLB) game.
There are widely considered to be four major professional men's sports leagues in the United States and Canada - NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL. The professional soccer league (MLS) has also achieved some popularity in the United States in recent years. During a 2019 survey, 39 percent of male respondents stated that the National Football League, NFL, was their favorite men's U.S. professional sports league to follow.
According to an analysis from early 2024, Disney ranked first among U.S. companies with the highest sports rights value, with *** billion U.S. dollars or a share of ** percent of the total sports rights. Disney's portfolio includes the National Football League (NFL), the National Basketball Association (NBA), and college sports, among others. Fox and Comcast followed in the ranking of the companies having the most valuable sports deals, including for example the NFL, MLB (Major League Baseball), and soccer.
The National Football League (NFL) was the most watched sports league in the United States in 2023. Viewers watched a combined 974.7 billion minutes of football action across the 284 televised games between November 2022 and November 2023. Meanwhile, Major League Baseball (MLB) ranked second with a little less than 330 billion combined minutes from viewers.
How much does a Super Bowl ad cost?
The price of running an ad during the Super Bowl has tripled over the past two decades. In 2024, advertisers paid an average of seven million U.S. dollars to air a 30-second commercial during the Super Bowl LVI broadcast. The renowned sporting event is highly anticipated each year and is watched by millions around the world. In the U.S., the 2024 edition of the Super Bowl was watched by over 123 million Americans.
How many people watch the World Series?
Unlike the Super Bowl, MLB World Series TV viewership experienced an overall decrease over the past two decades. The games of the 2023 World Series, in which the Texas Rangers achieved a five-game series win over the Arizona Diamondbacks, were watched by around nine million viewers. This shows a considerable drop from the previous year, when nearly 12 million people tuned in to see the Houston Astros win the Commissioner’s Trophy.