The viewing challenge of Gen Z, and the opportunity ahead |
Live sports remain one of the world’s most powerful shared experiences. But as the industry looks to the next generation of fans, it faces an inflection point. Gen Z — digital natives raised on social media and on-demand video — consume sports in a fundamentally different way from their parents and even older siblings.
The challenge isn’t that young people have lost interest in sports. Far from it. A YouGov study found that 74% of global consumers age 18-24 follow sports regularly, with 34% preferring to watch highlights over full events and only 30% watching entire games. Altman Solon’s 2024 Global Sports Survey echoes this, showing that younger fans favor short-form content for its convenience, accessibility and shareability, while 65% of sports executives fear live sports could lose relevance if these preferences aren’t addressed — and yet only 19% of execs see the industry doing something about it.
The implications are profound. For more than half a century, the live broadcast has been the financial and cultural bedrock of sports. But while the value of live sports rights continues to rise, the format for sports programming has barely changed. The industry now finds itself with a dual imperative: protect the economic engine of live games while reimagining what those experiences........