Forecast: Streamers to spend $12.5bn on sports rights in 2025
February 17, 2025
Streamers will account for a fifth of global sports rights spend in 2025 according to Ampere Analysis sports media rights data.
Their combined spend on sports rights is forecast to reach $12.5 billion (€11.9bn) this year. Much of this growth is driven by the expanding sports budgets of Netflix and Amazon, however, sports streaming platform DAZN will maintain its position as the world’s top spender on sports rights.
Key findings:
- Streaming services will account for 20 per cent of the global $64 billion spend on sports rights in 2025, up from 18 per cent in 2024
- Streamers have already committed to spending $12.5 billion on sports rights this year
- DAZN will retain its position as the top streaming spender on sports rights. The platform will account for one third of streaming spend on sports in 2025, boosted by its $1 billion deal for the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup. DAZN’s share of the global sports rights market will be even higher once the acquisition of Foxtel in Australia completes
- Leading general entertainment streamers with a global footprint are further establishing their positions as investors in sports media rights. Amazon is the second top streaming spender. Its share will increase from 18 per cent to 23 per cent following its acquisition of NBA rights from the 2025-26 season onwards. Other major rights held
by Amazon include NFL Thursday Night Football and UEFA Champions League - YouTube TV remains in third place, due to its single sports rights deal for the NFL Sunday Ticket worth a reported $2 billion per season
- Netflix is now the fourth biggest streaming investor in sports rights thanks to its three- year agreement to show Christmas Day NFL games and its $500 million per year deal with WWE which started in January.
Sport as a subscription-driver
- Sport is a valuable subscription driver for streamers as the market reaches saturation point. The introduction of advertising tiers provides streamers with further incentive to acquire live sport
- Ampere’s SVoD Economics data shows the recent impact of live sports in driving subscriptions:
- Netflix gained around 1.5 million sign-ups in the US following the Paul/Tyson boxing match. Some 80 per cent of these were still active one month later. The streamer signed up almost 700,000 subs for its NFL Christmas Day games
- Peacock gained 2m subscriptions across the weekend of its exclusive NFL play-off game in 2024
- Paramount+ added 2.4 million subscribers on the day of its Super Bowl coverage in 2024.
Danni Moore, Senior Analyst at Ampere Analysis, commented: “Over the last five years, streamers’ share of investment in sports rights has increased for two main reasons. The first is the growth of DAZN as a specialist sport streamer. In particular, DAZN has driven investment in top tier sports rights in major European markets such as Germany, Italy, Spain and most recently France. Then, as streaming nears saturation point, general entertainment platforms are adjusting their content investment strategies and have turned to sports as a key part of their subscription growth plans. They are recognising the benefit of acquiring rights to major season-long competitions for both subscriber acquisition and retention. Netflix, Peacock and Paramount all saw the commercial value of acquiring key sporting tournaments and one-off events in 2024 and we expect more of the same in 2025.”
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