The Women’s Super League (WSL) signed a five-year UK broadcast deal with Sky Sports and the BBC in 2021 for £8 million per season — a 16x increase on the previous deal. Three seasons in, the data on viewership, club revenue, and editorial coverage tells a more complicated story than “women’s football is exploding.”
The deal structure
Sky Sports holds rights to 35 WSL matches per season, including the marquee North London Derby and Manchester Derby fixtures. The BBC takes 18 matches free-to-air, leaning toward broadcasts featuring promoted clubs and English national team players. The remaining games are streamed on the FA Player.
The 2021 deal cost £8 million per year — split £6M Sky, £2M BBC. That goes up to £15M for the 2026-2031 cycle (negotiated late 2025). The growth is real but the absolute numbers remain small compared to the Premier League’s £6.7B per cycle.
Viewership trends
Average WSL match audience:
- 2020/21 (Sky pre-deal era): 35,000 average viewers per match
- 2021/22 (first Sky era): 87,000
- 2022/23 (post-Lionesses Euro 2022 win): 142,000
- 2023/24: 168,000
- 2024/25: 192,000
The trajectory is positive but the absolute numbers — even at peak — are below mid-tier Premier League viewership (~700,000 per match). The structural difference: WSL matches compete with Saturday afternoon Premier League fixtures and don’t have the Sky 4pm Sunday slot.
The BBC factor
The BBC’s 18-match free-to-air package has been the bigger driver of WSL profile. Match attendance numbers correlate strongly with whether the match was on BBC the previous week. The BBC Women’s Football Show (Sunday nights) has built a regular audience of 400,000-600,000 — significantly larger than Sky’s WSL coverage.
The argument for keeping more WSL on BBC is structural: free-to-air broadcasting builds the casual audience that eventually pays for Sky/streaming subscriptions. The opposite argument: Sky’s payment funds the league’s growth.
Club economics
The 2025/26 season was the first where WSL clubs received broadcast revenue distributions large enough to materially affect operations. Top six clubs received £1.2-£1.8M in broadcast distributions; bottom six received £400-£700k.
This is still small compared to the £100M+ per club from Premier League distributions, but it’s enough to fund full-time professional squads (current WSL standard) and modest stadium investments. Manchester City Women now play regular WSL fixtures at the Joie Stadium — a £20M investment partly funded by broadcast revenue growth.
What’s next
The 2026-2031 cycle will likely include:
- More live matches per season (52 vs current 53 — flat)
- Higher match-day royalties to clubs (£300k per televised match floor)
- Expanded BBC package (potentially 24 matches free-to-air vs current 18)
- New entrant: DAZN UK reportedly bidding for streaming-only secondary package
If DAZN enters with a streaming-only package, the WSL would have a tiered structure similar to men’s Champions League (linear TV + streaming hybrid). That would be a meaningful expansion.
The journalism gap
One area where women’s football broadcasting still lags: pre-match and post-match analysis. Sky Sports has solid match production but the studio analysis is thinner than for the Premier League — fewer dedicated WSL analysts, less deep tactical breakdown.
The BBC has invested more here through the Women’s Football Show, but the format remains weekend-focused. Daily news coverage of WSL clubs lives more on Twitter (Suzanne Wrack at The Guardian, for example) than on broadcast media.
This gap is the next frontier. Whether DAZN, BBC, or new entrants fill it will shape how the UK audience engages with the league between matches.
Editorial coverage from Hesgoal. We do not affiliate with broadcasters.