The National Basketball Association (NBA) is the second biggest sports competition by media rights value in its domestic market, where it currently earns US$2.7 billion per season from its national broadcast partners, ESPN and Warner Bros Discovery.
While the US is where the vast majority of the NBA’s broadcast revenue is generated, the basketball competition performs far better internationally than the National Football League (NFL) and Major League Baseball (MLB), earning US$715 million annually from its non-US media rights agreements, equal to 21 per cent of its total media rights value (excluding revenue generated from NBA League Pass and RSN rights fees).
This is owed in large part to the global popularity of basketball: excluding the US, the sport ranks fourth most popular globally, behind only soccer, the Olympics and tennis, and far ahead of American football, which ranks 12th.
The NBA typically attracts a younger audience compared to the average sports fan. While 40 per cent of all US sports fans surveyed by Ampere in Q4 2022 followed the NBA (ranked second highest), the league is the most-followed competition among the 18 to 34 age range at 43 per cent, usurping the NFL, which drops from 44 per cent to 38 per cent with the same demographic.
The NBA is also enjoyed by younger audiences outside of the US , with 26 per cent of sports fans aged 18 to 34 following the league, ranking fifth in total and first outside of soccer competitions.
The NBA is in fact the most popular basketball event even outside the US, where individual franchises within the league have also attained considerable fanbases. According to Ampere’s Q4 2022 survey, the LA Lakers are the most-followed basketball team, both in the US, where 41 per cent of basketball fans follow the franchise, and internationally, where 58 per cent follow.
Across the five international markets surveyed by Ampere with a significant basketball following – Brazil, Spain, China, Indonesia, USA and the UK – only two sports teams exceed the popularity of the LA Lakers: Real Madrid and FC Barcelona.
Across the 12 countries surveyed by Ampere in Q4 2023, 10.6 per cent of sports fans ranked the NBA in their top three sports competitions, the fourth highest overall, and 6.4 per cent rank it as their favourite competition, ranking third highest after the Premier League and the Fifa World Cup. Those who rank the NBA in their top three competitions are also more than twice as likely to subscribe to the NBA League Pass streaming platform than the average sports fan.
Despite some distance in value from the NFL, the most valuable sports competition in the US, the NBA still generates significant media rights value domestically, and exceeds all other US leagues in the international market. Coupled with a younger audience and domestic rights deals expiring in 2025, there is strong growth potential for the world’s most popular basketball competition.
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