MLB might be America’s pastime, and the Premier League has the biggest global reach of any sports league. But when it comes to making money, the NFL is the undisputed king, as it kicks off its 105th season next week.
The NFL’s financial might and trajectory is why private equity firms with more than $2 trillion in assets under management wanted a piece, which the league granted Tuesday when it approved passive stakes up to 10% from a select group of institutional funds.
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The NFL’s 32 teams generated an estimated $20.5 billion in revenue last year, 72% higher than MLB. The Premier League only has 20 teams, but its $8 billion for the 2022-23 season is more akin to the NHL than American football. NBA teams made roughly $12 billion during their most recent season.
All of these leagues earn money the same way, from gate receipts, sponsorships, concessions, merchandise, luxury suites and media contracts. But the scale of the revenue streams varies wildly in the different sports.
The average NFL franchise is worth $5.93 billion, 15% ahead of last year in Sportico’s NFL team valuations. The NFL’s salary cap—$225 million last year—is a boon to NFL owners, but the driving force of the league’s economics and its revenue is the leaguewide media deals.
The current crop of contracts is worth $12 billion a year on average, and owners are expected to opt out of the deals following the 2029 season after seeing how much ESPN, NBC and Amazon just committed to the NBA. NFL games represented 93 of the 100 most-watched TV broadcasts in 2023, but NBC and Amazon are now paying significantly more for their rights to NBA games than NFL games, while ESPN’s cost is similar for both leagues on a yearly basis.
NFL teams received $13 billion, or just over $400 million apiece, from leaguewide media, sponsorship, licensing and merchandise deals last year. In addition, teams got $25 million each as part of the NFL’s shared gate receipt system, which calls for 34% of each team’s ticket revenue to go toward a general pool to be shared equally. The result: 67% of the $20.5 billion in 2023 NFL revenue was distributed in equal parcels to the 32 teams.
The guaranteed annual checks from the league have juiced the entry price for an NFL team, with the Cincinnati Bengals value up 120% over the last four years.
Tickets and luxury suites are the next largest revenue bucket for NFL teams at $3 billion, or 15% of the total pie. Demand continues to outstrip supply for NFL tickets, with each team hosting only 10 home games per year, including preseason, and almost every stadium at or near capacity. Thirteen teams raised prices by double digits for 2023, and the average increase was 8.6%, per Team Marketing Report.
The San Francisco 49ers led the NFL in ticket revenue for the second straight year at $151 million, followed by Dallas ($145 million) and Philadelphia ($129 million). Tennessee ($73 million), Arizona ($74 million) and Washington ($80 million) ranked at the bottom. The Titans were one of five NFL teams that “hosted” an international game in 2023, which cut their ticket revenue by 10%, with one fewer game in their home stadium.
The Dallas Cowboys had the highest luxury suite revenue at roughly $130 million. New and expanded premium seating is a huge priority as teams look at stadium renovations or new buildings.
Sportico estimated team sponsorship revenue at just over $2 billion last year, or 10% of the total. The biggest sponsorship categories for the 2023 season were ticketing ($253 million), financial services ($225 million) and alcohol ($180 million), per SponsorUnited.
Revenue from concessions, parking, team stores and non-NFL events was $1.5 billion. The category got a major boost from Taylor Swift in 2023, as she performed all 53 of her U.S. shows in NFL stadiums. Swift kept almost all ticket revenue, with teams entitled to a small cut or rental fee for their venue. Yet, teams cashed in with concessions, parking and merchandise at the sold-out events, as well as from hefty premium seating demand.
And while MLB, NBA and NHL fret about their local TV revenue with the ongoing messiness in the RSN business, the NFL emerges on top there, as well. Almost all the TV inventory is controlled at the league level, and the only local media rights are from radio and preseason games. Local media represented less than 2% of overall revenue, versus more than 20% for MLB.
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