When was the last time a TV event made you put your phone down, call your friends, and plan your weekend around it? For the NFL, that’s happening every single week.

This season, through just five weeks, the league has pulled 18.58M viewers per game on average, its best since 2010 and second-highest ever. That’s an 8% increase from last year and 9% more than 2023. With the rate at which people stream, cut cords, and avoid traditional TV, this is an amazing achievement.

So what’s the secret sauce? Why is it that live and scheduled sports remain so special in our lives?

The ultimate “drop everything” TV

The answer is fairly simple – appointment TV. And no, it is not only fancy jargon, but it is the fact that fans do actually plan their life around certain NFL events. Unlike on-demand shows.

And even then, as you do not believe us, take a glance at this season:

• Week 2: Eagles vs. Chiefs – a record-breaking 33.8M viewers
• Week 5: Chiefs vs. Jaguars on ESPN – 22.3M viewers, a 40% increase on Week 5 last year.
• The London game, Vikings vs. Browns, even managed 6.4M viewers, up 35% on the league average for international games.

The lesson is quite obvious: live sports remain the king as they are raw, emotional, and get people talking. All the other leagues in the world would just envy having the same audience. The audience which is so obsessed with the league to the point where they actually plan their lives around the games. B

What makes NFL appointment TV work?

Strategy! These simple things make it possible for the NFL to make the impossible possible! Because they let everyone know something big is coming up. Here’s how:

Step one: Feed the fans with their preferred content, which includes major matchups between prominent players. And of course storyline is a must. For instance, show rivalries: Jalen Hurts vs Patrick Mahomes or Mahomes vs Herbert in Sao Paulo. That’s what attracts viewers.

Step two: Broadcasts games through every accessible platform, which includes both traditional television networks and streaming platforms. These platform allows viewers to access the content at any time and from any location, including buses and offices, and their homes.

Step three: Build a schedule. Like the NFL, they dedicate Sundays to their core audience while using Mondays for prime time and postseason games into a nationwide spectacle. Soon enough, you will see fans addicted to and watching the games on a regular basis. 

Step four: Make it social – the NFL isn’t just something you watch on your own, it’s a family affair, a group outing, a chat with your mates… with over 183M fans worldwide, it’s more than just a sport – it’s a weekly adrenaline rush for the whole world.

But even as the NFL nails the appointment TV thing, you’ve got to wonder: who’s really winning here – the fans or the networks?

The ad gold rush behind the NFL’s hype

Advertisers can’t get enough. During the 2024-25 season, NFL games accounted for 23.22% of all household TV ad impressions, more than doubling the next closest property. The Super Bowl generated 243% better results than standard advertising, while streaming-only games achieved 116% higher audience participation.

 The annual costs for Fox exceed $2 billion, while Amazon spends about $1B on NFL broadcasting rights. Even the Super Bowl allows advertisers to purchase 30-second commercial spots for $8 million each. Hence, the NFL and its partners face a critical challenge to operate their business model because they need to sustain their operations without overwhelming fans or exceeding their financial capacity.

The NFL’s growing pains

Even the king of live TV has headaches.

• Fragmentation of the audience: The audience is viewing TV content on different platforms, other than being confined to traditional TV networks such as CBS, NBC, and Fox. They do view it on TikTok videos, YouTube clips, RedZone, NFL+, Amazon Prime, Peacock, and Netflix (soon). The diversification of viewers into the various platforms makes reaching the same audiences difficult.

• Broadcast deals are very expensive: the NFL earns over 110 billion from the television broadcasting rights. These tremendous costs are what drive networks to fit adverts within and make any game seem to be a huge event in order to offset the investments.

• Viewer fatigue: Football may become tiresome when it is nearly every day, Sunday afternoons and evenings, Thursdays and simulcasts, and one-off games of the playoffs. Due to this, most of the viewers do not even view an entire game, but highlights or RedZone only.

• Counting chaos:  To better represent streaming and co-viewing, Nielsen made a change in 2025 to add big data and panel tracking, but that also brought confusion. The NFL insists that millions of viewers on digital platforms or watching on a social basis are not counted in their entirety.

And yet, in the middle of these headaches, the NFL remains the template everyone else studies.

Lessons every league should steal

Well, the NFL did not get this massive by chance. They cracked the code. In case other leagues desire to bridge the gap, this is the cheat card:

• Make each and every match a can’t-miss event. Keep game times consistent.

• Tell constant stories- rivalries, redemption arcs, record chases.

• Learn the media mix so that all fans know where to watch.

• Ask rating agencies and platforms to provide them with real numbers.

Easy to say, tough to execute. But seems like a few leagues are already copying the strategy.

Who’s catching up and who’s still in the penalty box?

This is the current state of the field:

• WNBA: The upcoming Versant deal brings 50+ USA Network games and Ion’s Friday night block starting in 2026. Plus, this season, the WNBA experienced a 72% increase in viewership but needs to develop better consistency and generate more excitement.

• NWSL: With a Sunday night broadcasting schedule and its emphasis on storytelling, the NWSL will take a new era in media in 2026 upon reaching its 5x viewership increase this year. But this present good trend should be stitched into an orderly system.

• NBA: Retain viewers with their new ESPN and NBC/Peacock, ABC, and Amazon streaming schedules, but several streaming platforms may result in viewer fatigue.

• MLB: garners global attention in the playoffs, yet the lack of uniformity in its broadcasting prevents the league’s growth

Sure, every sports recognize that appointment viewing surpasses traditional broadcast timing. But what next?

The next rights battle

The next chapter is chaos in motion. Media rights will undergo a major transformation because prime broadcast slots and streaming platform battles will determine the future lineup of all professional sports leagues. The NFL plans to start negotiations for new media rights in 2026, despite its current deals running until 2033, and NBC holds Super Bowl LXIV broadcasting rights until 2030.

Meanwhile, fans face multiple streaming options, including Peacock and Prime Video and YouTube TV and Netflix (soon) and TikTok, and the upcoming service from a new provider. The transition from simple content access to overwhelming content overload might become a reality. And in the end, the sports experience will suffer its fastest decline because of excessive choices and multiple subscription services.

Because the NFL doesn’t just sell games, it sells moments. And that’s what every league on Earth is chasing.