Brazil is putting the World Cup on YouTube for free
While viewers in the United States face increased fragmentation, a different model is succeeding in Brazil. World Cup fans in Brazil can now watch every game for free through a YouTube channel.
CazéTV, a YouTube channel with more than 39 million subscribers founded by Brazilian streamer Casimiro Miguel, holds the rights to show all 104 World Cup matches for free in the country.
According to Reuters, CazéTV peaked at 21.3 million simultaneous connected devices when Brazil beat Japan 2-1, making it one of the most-watched live streams in YouTube history.
The owners of CazéTV, LiveMode, have even taken the concept outside Brazil. They launched the YouTube channel LiveModeTV in Portugal, with the backing of Cristiano Ronaldo, and acquired the rights to stream 34 World Cup games for free. The channel, which launched in November 2025, has 875,000 subscribers.
LiveMode is betting that younger sports fans, who are more interested in streaming and less interested in cable, are looking to platforms like YouTube to consume sports.
“Every major sports organisation is asking how to connect with audiences whose media habits have changed significantly,” LiveMode co-founder Sergio Lopes told Reuters. “Brazil is one of the places where this transformation has moved very quickly, so it has allowed us to test and refine ideas at scale.”
This Brazilian model has not yet caught on in the United States. In fact, American sports fans have increasingly complained about fragmentation in recent years. All four major American sports leagues now have exclusive games on various paid streaming services.
Both the NFL and MLB have experimented with free games on YouTube in past years. MLB’s agreement lasted four years, from 2019 through 2022, while the NFL game aired just last year. The NFL also has an agreement with YouTube TV for NFL Sunday Ticket, but that requires an additional payment.
What differentiates the LiveMode approach from those agreements is that it has launched full channels through YouTube, more similar to ESPN. The MLB and NFL games were one-offs.
A channel like that on YouTube would likely have economics similar to those of over-the-air television. Channels charge carriage fees on cable, while streaming services make money through subscriptions, but a free YouTube channel would primarily need to rely on advertising revenue.
If someone can make the economics work, it could be an interesting play to replicate the model that has already succeeded in Brazil. At a time when sports fans continue to complain about the cost of watching live sports, it would at least be a very good PR move if such a network could somehow acquire marquee rights.