The United State men’s national team inspired confidence on Friday night that it can make a run in the 2026 World Cup. At SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, the Americans turned in a showing that belonged in Hollywood. They started and finished aggressive, dominating possession throughout a 4-1 victory over Paraguay in their first match of group play.
The USMNT‘s four goals were the most it’s scored in a World Cup match, period. And, according to Fox Sports PR, the 15,986,000 viewers, on average, the USMNT drew on Fox, Fox One and Tubi were a record, too.
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In fact, that made up the most-watched USMNT telecast ever. It doubled as the most-watched men’s World Cup group stage telecast in English-language U.S. history, according to Fox.
The total viewing audience, when factoring in an average of 8.9 million people watching on Telemundo/Peacock, was close to 25 million, per Yahoo Sports’ Steven Goff.
The showdown between Group D teams peaked with 18,860,000 viewers from 10:45-11 p.m. ET, per Fox. The average viewership was up 106% from the USMNT’s 2022 World Cup opener in Qatar, where it pulled in an average of 7,763,000 viewers amid a 1-1 tie with Wales on Nov. 21 of that year.
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In its ratings report, Fox cited Nielsen preliminary fast-nationals, Adobe Analytics and data from the Fox-owned streaming service Tubi. It’s worth noting that Nielsen shifted to a new methodology last fall that couples its traditional panel with “Big Data” from smart TVs and set-top boxes. That’s significant when considering the surging figures, as is the fact that, per Sports Media Watch, the 2026 World Cup is just the second since Nielsen started including out-of-home viewing in its estimates.
What’s interesting is that there were higher reported viewership numbers for the USMNT’s 2-2 draw with Portugal during group play of the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. But, as detailed by Richard Deitsch on Saturday, ESPN, which broadcast the 2014 game in question, and Fox, which broadcast Friday’s USMNT game, apparently used different telecast numbers to determine ratings.
“Both likely will claim the record,” Deitsch, host of The Sports Media Podcast, noted on X.
Right from the jump, this year’s World Cup has indicated that a multitude of viewership records are in danger of being broken. The tournament’s opener, a Thursday afternoon match between Mexico and South Africa, attracted an average of 6,309,000 viewers while Mexico secured a 2-0 win in Mexico City, per Fox, which cited the same combination of ratings data as above on Friday.
That meant that, according to Fox, Mexico-South Africa was the most-watched men’s World Cup opening match and non-USMNT World Cup group stage telecast in English-language U.S. history.
