NFL beats NBA for ‘most watched sports league’ by a ‘mammoth’ margin with 9.2 million average viewership per match, no other league anywhere close

The NFL clocked in an average viewership of 9.2 million people per game this season.

NFL beats NBA for ‘most watched sports league’ by a ‘mammoth’ margin with 9.2 million average viewership per match, no other league anywhere close

NFL viewership has hit record highs this season (via Marca and Yahoo)

The NFL remains the undisputed king of all sports in the United States of America. The sport tops the entire nation in terms of viewership recorded with an average of 9.2 million viewers per game. This number leaves other sports such as basketball, hockey, baseball, and soccer in the dust. The NBA ranked second on this list with an average viewership of 711,000 per game.

This season, the league has witnessed a positive surge in viewership owing to the fact that it has established diverse platforms on which fans can stream the games. Amazon’s Prime Video is the most popular avenue for fans to stream games, and Thursday Night Football in particular is exclusive to the platform. The league’s efforts to promote ease of access of viewership to a larger fanbase is working! This year, as per the Sports Business Journal, the NFL viewership has reached an eight-year-high with an average of 17.2 million viewers through the first nine weeks of the season.

YouTube video

Prime Video is averaging 12.7 million viewers while NBC is averaging nearly 20 million viewers for the Sunday Night Football package. This year, the NFL took the initiative of hosting its first-ever Thanksgiving game. The Green Bay Packers took on the Detroit Lions while the Washington Commanders took on the Dallas Cowboys. Of course, the San Francisco 49ers played the Seattle Seahawks as well. On this day alone, the league’s viewership at the peak was 34.1 million viewers, which is an astounding number.

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The NFL’s marketing strategy combined with the multiple viewership options has helped increase the viewership of football games

These numbers trump the NBA’s viewership during this year’s finals when at the peak, there were 11.64 million viewers tuning into the game. Let’s take a look at the World Series, at its peak, the five-game series averaged 9.11 million viewers on Fox. These are championship games and yet they do not come close to the NFL in terms of viewership.

Roger Goodell is here to stay as the NFL Commissioner until 2027. (IMAGE: AP)
Roger Goodell’s strategies have resulted in the NFL viewership skyrocketing this season. (IMAGE: AP)

The league managed to get nearly double the amount of viewers as the Academy Awards on Thanksgiving alone. This number is bound to increase come playoff time. So what is the NFL doing right that other leagues are unable to do?

The league has provided multiple streaming avenues for fans this season, from Prime to YouTube and your conventional network TVs, the NFL has ensured that they offer the most lucrative options to their target market. Another reason for the surge in viewership is the growing popularity of sports wagering sites. Draft Kings, ESPN Bet, and other sites have aided in boosting the popularity of betting on games and players’ performance.

Then there is fantasy football, a longstanding custom amongst diehard football fans who tune in to games to keep a close watch on how the players on their team perform. The final reason has to be the game itself.

NFL game
The NFL (via Forbes)

There have been a lot of close games this season that have led to fans sitting on the edge of their seats. This season, there are a lot of good teams, with just two weeks to go in the regular season, there are still a lot of teams that can enter the playoff picture by performing well. The 2023-24 season has been nothing less than unusual because there have been a lot of injuries among key players. However, the silver lining has been that fans have gotten to see underdogs rise up to the occasion.

When you take into account all the above-mentioned factors, it really does not come as that big of a surprise that the NFL is the most-watched sporting league in the entire nation. Football is a part of people’s lives and it has become a part of their routine to watch the games on Thursdays, Sundays, and Mondays.

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