2026 FIFA World Cup opening match scores record audiences for Fox, Telemundo
Awful Announcing • • sports
Key Points:
- The opening match of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, where Mexico defeated South Africa 2-0, attracted an average of 6.3 million viewers on Fox's English-language channels, marking the highest viewership ever for a FIFA World Cup opening match in English in the U.S.
- This viewership represents a 97% increase from Fox’s average non-U.S. Men's National Team group-stage telecast in 2022, peaking at over 8 million viewers during a key quarter-hour.
- Telemundo reported an even larger average audience of 12.1 million viewers across its Spanish-language platforms, making it the most-watched FIFA World Cup opening game in Spanish and overall U.S. TV history.
- The match also set records for the most-streamed World Cup Mexico match and the most-streamed Group Stage match in Spanish-language history.
- These figures are the first to be measured using Nielsen’s new Big Data + Panel standard, which tends to increase live sports audience estimates compared to previous measurement methods.