Leaders are bullish for 2026; younger fans’ growth is driven by highlights and other non-live formats alongside live sports
ZURICH — The 7th edition of Altman Solon’s Global Sports Survey finds the sports sector entering a new growth cycle, supported by strong industry confidence and changing fan viewing behavior. The study includes input from 250 senior global sports executives and a survey of 6,000 sports fans across the U.S., U.K., Germany, Spain, Italy, and France.
Industry confidence is high: 88% of leaders are optimistic about the sports sector’s outlook over the next 12 months, with 43% reporting a more positive view than last year. Optimism is strongest among investors and tech and service providers, signaling continued capital inflows and innovation across the ecosystem.
That confidence is reinforced by fan behavior. Sports viewing remains strong across age groups and continues to grow, most notably among 25–34-year-olds, where total consumption is the highest of any cohort and has increased 6% compared to three to five years ago. This group watches over four hours of live sports per week, similar to older audiences, while consuming significantly more highlights and other non-live formats. Among 18–34-year-olds, the shift is decisive: they spend nearly three times as much time on non-live formats as on live sports, underscoring that consumption is expanding beyond the linear live broadcast.
"Our findings support renewed optimism and challenge some of the narratives of recent years that younger generations won’t engage with sports content,” says David Dellea, Partner at Altman Solon. “Younger fans simply consume differently, with streaming services and short-form content increasingly serving as their preferred gateway to sports content."
To engage fans in 2026, Altman Solon suggests sports executives and rights owners evolve toward a multi-format, multi-channel offering, as media consumption is no longer anchored in linear TV. Format preferences vary widely by age, requiring new approaches to fan engagement, rights packaging, licensing, and monetization. Younger fans, for example, are less likely to watch full live games: 39% of 18–24-year-olds typically watch the entire event, compared with 61% among fans aged 65 and over.
"We believe the industry is entering a new era of accelerated transformation, where the scale of opportunity matches the scale of change required to capture it,” says Matt Del Percio, Associate Partner at Altman Solon. “Sports monetization gains will be increasingly driven by leveraging fan and team data, not just live broadcasts.”
Additional findings point to a growing monetization challenge as consumption expands beyond live games, reinforcing the need for smarter packaging and differentiated offerings across formats and platforms.
Additional findings also highlight a monetization gap as viewing expands beyond live games, with willingness to pay typically lower for non-live formats. At the same time, the rise of creator-led and AI-enabled content is enabling greater differentiation, creating new opportunities for rights owners and platforms to build value through smarter packaging and product innovation.
The survey also points to continued investment momentum across the broader sports economy, where annual operating spend supports a deep ecosystem of service and technology suppliers. Looking ahead, industry leaders expect investment to remain concentrated in teams and clubs while accelerating in services and sports tech, reflecting growing conviction in the infrastructure layer underpinning long-term fan engagement and revenue growth.
“Sports are evolving into a comprehensive, multi-tiered asset class,” says Christoph Sommer, Associate Partner at Altman Solon. “With premium assets scarce, we expect more capital to move toward mid-tier properties and the technology and services layer underpinning the sports economy.”
Altman Solon will release two additional chapters from the 7th Global Sports Survey in the coming weeks, focusing on Unlocking the Full Value of Sports IP and The Next Frontier for Sports Investment.
This is the seventh edition of the annual Altman Solon Global Sports Survey. To produce the report, Altman Solon surveyed 6,000 adult consumers and 250 senior sports executives across six countries: the U.S., U.K., Germany, Spain, Italy, and France. The sports fan survey was fielded in December 2025 by partner research agency, IRIS Sport.