Goooool v goal: English speakers flock to Telemundo for lively World Cup coverage | World Cup 2026

Soccer fans looking to watch the 2026 World Cup on US television have been presented with two very different options this tournament.

The first is Fox One, a cousin of Fox News owned by the same parent company and the sole network airing matches in English in the US. Audiences tuning in to Fox, which acquired the exclusive English broadcast rights in 2015, are met with coverage that reflects the network’s “America first” aesthetic, with promos for pro-Trump talkshows, advertising breaks during games and the frequent, grating presence of host Alexi Lalas.

The second option is Telemundo, available through a subscription to NBC Universal’s streaming service Peacock, which holds the Spanish-language rights to air the tournament. Its telecasts tend to reflect both the global nature of the sport and provide more intense, unabridged coverage of the matches. It also costs roughly half as much to subscribe to Peacock as to Fox One.

At Smithfield Hall, a Manhattan sports bar and longtime hub for watching soccer in New York City, staff have received requests for the Telemundo broadcast, and the bar switched to the channel for the opening ceremonies when Fox decided to not air the full event.

“Personally I often watch the Spanish-Language programming for the football,” said Kieron Slattery, the bar’s co-owner, who does not speak Spanish.

For millions of US viewers, even those whose primary language is English, Telemundo has become their preferred way to watch the World Cup.

“While U.S. Hispanics represent 20% of the population, Telemundo and Peacock TV have captured 49% of the combined World Cup audience through the first 48 FIFA World Cup matches,” NBC Universal said last month. “Bottom line: nearly 1 out of every 2 World Cup viewers in the U.S. is watching in Spanish”.

Telemundo has repeatedly broken Spanish-language programming records throughout the tournament. Its broadcast of the Mexico-England game drew 23.2 million US viewers, about 1.5 million more than tuned into Fox’s coverage, in what Variety reported was the largest audience for any Spanish-language telecast in US history.

‘Passion transcends what you’re saying’

Telemundo attracting so many English-speaking fans is a surprise for the company, which largely marketed towards a Hispanic audience of Spanish-speaking and bilingual viewers before the tournament.

“Somehow there is a language-agnostic passion that transcends what you’re saying, that I guess is just connecting from an emotional level,” said Joaquin Duro, the executive vice-president of sports for NBCUniversal Telemundo.

Viewership of Telemundo’s coverage through the first 100 games of the tournament was up 155% compared with the 2022 World Cup, according to NBC Universal’s calculation of audience metrics. The quarter-finals averaged about 10.5 million viewers across the four matches, becoming the most watched quarters stage in Spanish-language media history.

The company has also developed a vocal fanbase online, including a trend of social media posts comparing the bland, formal English-language play-by-play with Telemundo’s energetic Spanish-language commentary. Telemundo’s decision to not air ads during in-game hydration breaks – Fifa’s newly created three-minute pauses which have received widespread backlash and boos at matches for splitting up each half of the game – has also become a point of pride for the network.

“I told my boss many, many months ago,” Duro said. “I’m not gonna be the first person to create a four-quarter soccer game in the United States”.

Although social media sites are full of posts expressing support for Telemundo’s coverage – especially Argentine announcer Andrés Cantor’s emphatic, sustained, often-hoarse calls of “goooool” whenever someone scores – there are also economic differences between the two US networks carrying the games. A base-level monthly subscription to Peacock costs $10.99 in comparison to Fox One’s plans, which start at $19.99.

The spike in popularity for Telemundo also reflects that more people in the US are watching this World Cup than any previous tournament. Fox reported a 216% increase in its average viewership for the round of 16 when compared with the 2022 World Cup, buoyed up by a record 30 million viewers watching the US Men’s National Soccer Team’s match against Belgium.

Telemundo has been planning its World Cup coverage for years, making requests to Fifa in 2024 about access to camera positions around the field and planning host setups with the intent to differentiate its coverage. Duro and other staff created lists of country-specific announcers, often former players who have a relationship with national teams, to pair with each match.

Duro argues that the result of the planning is a more immersive, more authoritative viewing experience. Commentators are experts on the game, but also rarely pretend that they are purely objective analysts and don’t have their own teams to support, creating a sense of community with fans watching at home. Argentina player turned Telemundo analyst Maxi Rodríguez even developed a pre-game ritual with Lionel Messi where the former teammates kiss and embrace before each match.

While Duro credits distribution, the lower price point and other factors for Telemundo’s success this tournament, he also believes the years of careful preparation have created a more exciting way of watching the World Cup regardless of what language viewers speak.

“We read it on social media,” Duro said. “People saying: ‘Half of the stuff I don’t understand, but I know by the rhythm and by the speed that something is about to happen.’”