MLS not seeing immediate post-World Cup attendance bump

The excitement around soccer during the 2026 FIFA World Cup in North America hasn’t resulted in increased attendance at MLS matches in the two months since the league resumed play following its seven-week break, according to an analysis conducted by Sports Business Journal. The 154 regular-season matches played since the league restarted its season on July 16 have drawn an average of 22,098, which is 1.7% lower than during the same period in 2025 and virtually flat compared with pre-break attendance this season.

Average attendance for the recently concluded Leagues Cup competition, which featured 18 teams from each of MLS and Liga MX, was also flat relative to the 2025 edition, with matches drawing 17,463 fans per ticketed session. Total attendance for the competition increased 7% year over year, driven by a higher number of ticketed sessions due to fewer single-session doubleheaders in 2026.

MLS is still on pace to record the second-highest average attendance season in its history, behind only 2024. The league’s season-to-date attendance average of 22,106 is up 1.1% from the same point last year.

Even with post-World Cup attendance virtually flat, MLS sees signs of underlying demand that it believes are being obscured by an unfavorable schedule and the World Cup’s impact on soccer fans’ discretionary spending this summer. The league is also viewing the World Cup’s impact through a two-year lens, with attendance over the past two months representing only one piece of the picture.

Due to the seven-week break and the use of many MLS stadiums during the World Cup, the league has had to condense its schedule this season, resulting in a heavier midweek slate in the latter portion of the schedule. MLS has played 47 midweek matches from July through mid-September, compared with just 14 during the same period in 2025. Overall, 33% of the league’s matches since the World Cup break have been played on weekdays, compared with 12% prior to the break, and weekday matches have averaged 11% lower attendance than weekend matches.

In addition, the league contends that soccer fans who had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to attend World Cup matches at extraordinarily high prices over the summer may have had less discretionary income available for MLS matches. FIFA projected the World Cup would generate more than $3B in ticketing and hospitality revenue.

“Based on the World Cup and what FIFA projected — $3 billion taken out of the marketplace — the idea that we’ve managed to sustain a slight increase really demonstrates resilience and growth,” MLS CBO Camilo Durana said.

Durana also pointed to other metrics trending up following the World Cup. With 24 of the league’s 30 clubs already selling season tickets for 2027, he said new season-ticket purchases are up 23% from the same point last year.

MLS also said it has seen increased viewership for match broadcasts, which are distributed primarily through Apple TV. The league has gained 4.8 million net new followers since the World Cup, while post-World Cup website page views are up 36% compared with pre-tournament levels.

“If we can sustain this energy and this momentum across viewership, social engagement, video views — every consumer engagement metric — then I think it’ll be a positive,” Durana said. “We’re not judging the success of the World Cup two months after the tournament. We’re looking at a two-year runway and that was what we set out to do from the beginning.”

MLS has touted the World Cup marketing campaign it developed with Ogilvy as the most robust in league history, with sources telling SBJ that clubs each contributed between $500,000 and $1M to the centralized effort. The league aired national TV spots during both semifinal matches and the final on Fox.

Separately, many clubs invested millions in local market activations during the tournament, resulting in tens of thousands of new customer records. In addition, 22 teams planned a “First Match on Us” promotion, offering free match tickets to new fans. The scale of those efforts has varied widely, largely based on available inventory.

“We’ve seen some tremendous success in some markets where they’re actually releasing more ‘First Match on Us’ tickets, and different teams have different strategies,” Durana said. “Some were focused on the immediate weeks after the World Cup, some were the entire fall. There’s still ongoing engagement of fans and fans who opted for games later in the season.”