FIFA’s World Cup Rights Shake-Up Could Favor NBC Over Fox

FIFA confirmed it wants to bundle its World Cup rights in English and Spanish for 2030, setting the stage for a dramatic fight between major media networks and streamers.

The global governing body announced Thursday that it’s opening up bids for U.S. and Puerto Rican TV rights for the 2030 World Cup, which Spain, Portugal, and Morocco will primarily host. The 2034 World Cup in Saudi Arabia is also an option for bidders.

FIFA’s preference is to pool the English and Spanish language rights together with one broadcast partner, a spokesperson tells Front Office Sports.

This is great news for NBC, the parent company of soccer juggernaut Telemundo.

Telemundo had a wildly successful World Cup, capturing a portion of non-Spanish speakers who chose their coverage over Fox. The network (including Universo, Peacock, and Telemundo streaming) averaged 6.3 million viewers across the entire tournament, and drew roughly 24 million viewers for the final.

Telemundo also has the U.S. Spanish-language rights for major soccer competitions, including the Premier League, U.S. Men’s and Women’s National Team matches, the Bundesliga, Serie A, and, starting next year, the UEFA Champions League. NBC also holds the U.S. rights to the Premier League.

A Telemundo exec told Sports Business Journal this summer that NBC is “beyond exploring” a package deal with FIFA to show the World Cup in both languages. NBC and Telemundo have a similar joint deal with the Olympics.

FIFA’s goal to pool the rights is bad news for Fox, FIFA’s broadcast partner for the last three World Cup cycles.

Fox got a massive discount on the rights, paying only $485 million for the 2026 tournament. Viewership was strong, reaching 37 million viewers for the U.S. Men’s National Team, and 42.5 million viewers for the Argentina–Spain final.

But the network’s Spanish-language offering, Fox Deportes, is much less robust than Telemundo.

ESPN chairman Jimmy Pitaro recently said Disney is “of course” interested in getting back the rights that ABC had for 20 years before Fox. ESPN has a Spanish-language offering in ESPN Deportes.

Another major player in World Cup rights is Netflix, which could prove to be NBC’s biggest challenger in the upcoming bidding war. The streamer holds the U.S. rights for the 2027 and 2031 Women’s World Cups, as well as the 2030 World Cup rights in host country Spain.

FIFA’s chief business officer Romy Gai told reporters Thursday that FIFA hasn’t decided whether hydration breaks will be part of the 2030 World Cup yet, which would have a huge impact on ad inventory. Gai also said the governing body is “concretely considering” moving the 2034 World Cup to the winter for heat reasons, as was the case for Qatar in 2022.

Gai said Fox and Telemundo did not have an exclusive negotiating period before FIFA went to the market with the rights, and said FIFA hopes to assign the rights by the end of the year. Bids are due in late November.

“We are excited at the idea to capitalize [on] the momentum,” Gai said. “We expect to land in a territory that can recognize clearly the evolution of the media industry in the last years for the top properties like the FIFA World Cup, and also the specific success that we experienced globally, but particularly in the U.S.”