The business of UK sport, 2026: where the money is moving

The headline numbers for UK sport look strong. Premier League clubs earned a record £6.8bn in 2024/25, adults in England are more active than at any point in the last decade, and women’s sport drew its biggest television audience on record in 2025.

Look underneath, though, and the money is moving in specific directions. It is shifting from broadcast towards fans and partners, towards women’s sport, and towards the forms of activity people organise for themselves. It is also concentrating.

Football’s growth is now fan-led

Deloitte’s Annual Review of Football Finance, published in July 2026, puts Premier League club revenue at £6.8bn in 2024/25, up 8%. The mix of that growth matters more than the total. Matchday revenue rose 15% to more than £1bn for the first time. Commercial revenue rose 13% to £2.4bn, the largest gain of any stream. Broadcast revenue, still the biggest single line at £3.4bn, grew by just 2%.

The growth is not evenly shared. The big six account for 73% of Premier League commercial revenue. In the Championship, revenue fell 2% to £942m and pre-tax losses rose 12% to £355m. Even at the top, record income did not mean profit: Premier League clubs made a combined pre-tax loss of £948m, with wages at a record £4.4bn, or 65% of revenue.

What this means: the next pound of growth in football is coming from people who attend, buy and partner, not from central media deals. Clubs and leagues outside the top tier cannot rely on broadcast to close the gap. They need to know their supporters properly, price and package matchday well, and sell partnerships on evidence of audience rather than league position.

Women’s sport is growing faster, from a smaller base

Women’s Super League clubs generated £90m in 2024/25, up 39% from £65m, according to Deloitte. Commercial revenue was the largest stream at £41m, up £15m. Matchday income grew 16% to £14m and broadcast 11% to £11m. Two cautions sit alongside the growth. The top four clubs took 71% of revenue, up from 66%, and group income from parent organisations still made up 27% (£23.9m) of the total.

Audiences are growing too. The Women’s Sport Trust’s end-of-year report, published in February 2026 using BARB data, records 397 million hours of women’s sport viewed on UK television in 2025, a record, with 48.0 million people reached, up from 45.2 million in 2024. The same report shows that two tournaments, the UEFA Women’s EURO and the Women’s Rugby World Cup, accounted for just over 60% of those viewing hours.

The commercial signal is clear. The Trust found 28.9 million UK adults are aware of at least one women’s sport sponsorship, and 30% of consumers think more favourably of brands that support women’s sport through sponsorship, compared with 20% for men’s sport.

What this means: women’s sport gives partners strong brand effects relative to its current awareness, and that is a real selling point. The task for governing bodies and clubs is converting tournament peaks into year-round domestic audiences, and building revenue that does not depend on a parent club or a single major event. That means owned data, season-long content and partnership packages built around the domestic calendar.

Participation is rising, but unevenly

Sport England’s Active Lives Adult Survey for November 2024 to November 2025, released in April 2026, shows 64.6% of adults in England, around 30.9 million people, meeting the guideline of 150 minutes of activity a week. That is 859,000 more than the previous year. Running and fitness grew strongly, while activity fell among 16 to 34 year olds, a new trend.

The gaps are widening. 73.2% of the most affluent adults are active, compared with 53.8% of the least affluent. Among children, the Active Lives Children and Young People Survey for the 2024-25 academic year, published in December 2025, found 49.1% meet the guideline of 60 minutes a day, the highest since the survey began, while 28.4% do less than an average of 30 minutes a day.

What this means: demand for activity is healthy, but it is drifting towards flexible, self-organised formats and towards better-off households. Governing bodies whose model rests on affiliated club membership need products that meet people where they already are: casual formats, easy online booking, pay-as-you-play and digital membership. The fall among 16 to 34 year olds is a warning for anyone whose future fans and members sit in that age group.

Sport’s economic weight is steady, not growing

The DCMS Economic Estimates for 2024, published as provisional figures in February 2026, put the sport sector’s gross value added at £20.6bn, 0.8% of UK GVA, down 0.3% on 2023. On the broader Sport Satellite Account definition, DCMS estimates that the wider sport sector directly contributed £63.2bn to the UK economy in 2024, with 1.3 million filled jobs.

What this means: sport is a large and stable part of the economy, but in aggregate it is not expanding. Growth is a share game. The organisations that win will take audience, attention and partnership spend from others, and that requires sharper propositions and better evidence of value.

What to do next

First, build the direct relationship. Matchday and commercial income are growing fastest in football, and both rely on knowing who your audience is. A single view of supporters and participants, built on consented data, is the foundation for ticketing, membership, retail and sponsorship.

Second, sell partnerships on audience outcomes. Partners want reach, affinity and engagement they can measure. Women’s sport already has evidence of stronger brand effects. Every rights holder should be able to show who it reaches and what changes for a partner as a result.

Third, design for how people now take part. Rising activity is being driven by flexible formats and is concentrating among the better-off. Governing bodies and clubs that offer simple, digital, low-commitment ways in will grow participation and open new revenue at the same time.

Minshall Group works with governing bodies, clubs, events and sports businesses on commercial strategy and digital products that turn shifts like these into revenue.