This year’s FIFA Women’s World Cup final between the USA and the Netherlands was a thriller, and the USWNT players weren’t the only ones walking away with a victory. The TV networks that aired all of the matches experienced viewership highs during the last game, and record-breaking numbers during each stage of the tournament.
The 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup final became the most-streamed final in tournament history on Fox Sports.
FOX reached over 14 million viewers and peaked at nearly 19 million during the final match this past Sunday hosted in France, even with the game airing during a holiday weekend and in a non-ideal early time slot due to the time zone difference. The game is now the most-watched soccer game on English-language television in the U.S. since the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup final, which was hosted in Canada and garnered approximately 26 million viewers with a convenient prime time slot. This also means that the 2019 final outperformed the men’s 2018 FIFA World Cup final which drew over 11 million viewers in the U.S.
According to FOX Sports, this year’s final also now stands as the most-streamed FIFA Women’s World Cup final ever, up 402% since 2015. The game drew an average minute audience of 289,000 viewers.
On the social media front, FOX Sports saw record-breaking audience numbers across its Twitter and YouTube platforms. In total, the network reported that it garnered nearly one billion minutes of digital content across its platforms throughout the entire tournament.
Last Sunday’s game became Telemundo’s most-watched FIFA Women’s World Cup match in Spanish-language history.
Telemundo, which had the Spanish-language broadcasting rights to the tournament, also set a new record for the event. The final reached 1.6 million viewers, which is the highest viewership it has seen in a game without Mexico as a participant. It also now stands as the most-watched FIFA Women’s World Cup match in Spanish-language history.
The success of the tournament’s ratings this year speaks volumes about the nation’s growing love of soccer, the women’s team, and Americans’ love of cheering on their country during one of the most competitive and unifying sporting events in the world. It also goes to show how the explosion of devices along with streaming have truly impacted TV viewership in recent years, and the new ways it has offered fans to indulge in their passion of watching live sports and to tune in to watch the USWNT become four-time FIFA Women’s World Cup champions.
