WNBA Hits 3M Attendance Milestone in Season’s Final Week

With less than a week left in the WNBA season, the league hit another growth milestone.

The WNBA eclipsed 3 million total attendees for its regular-season games Sunday, three weeks after breaking its regular-season attendance record of 2.36 million set in 2002, according to data from Across the Timeline. 

The league benefited from its longest regular season ever, stretching out the season to 44 games per team—the maximum number of games allowed under the current CBA. However, the 2025 average attendance (10,954 attendees) is still the most for a season, and will likely break the previous record set in 1998 of 10,868 attendees.

The WNBA will need to average 8,511 attendees for the remaining 10 games to break the average attendance record. Only three teams averaged fewer than 8,000 fans at their home games this season—and the two lowest teams (Washington Mystics, Atlanta Dream) already hosted their home finales.

The Indiana Fever and Golden State Valkyries are the biggest drivers of attendance growth. 

The Fever led the league in total attendance, drawing nearly 700,000 fans when combining home and road contests—100,000 more than any other team. This was driven by about half the league moving home games against Indiana to larger arenas to accommodate fans driven by interest in Caitlin Clark.

Unfortunately, Clark was able to play in only 13 total games this year, with five coming on the road. Three of those road games were moved to bigger arenas, including on July 15 in Boston against the Connecticut Sun. Clark suffered a right groin injury in the fourth quarter, and it would ultimately be her final contest of the 2025 season.

On the other hand, Golden State set the standard for expansion teams with its home court attendance. The Valkyries announced Saturday that they sold out all 22 home games at the Chase Center this season. They also set the WNBA record for total (397,408) and average (18,064) home attendance.

Golden State also clinched a playoff berth, becoming the first expansion team in league history to qualify for the postseason. However, the team may not get to host a playoff game at the Chase Center. Its first-round home game will be moved to the SAP Center in San Jose due to a schedule conflict.