Argentina defeating France during the World Cup final on Sunday surpassed rankings recorded for Thanksgiving weekend’s U.S. vs. England, making it the most-watched men’s World Cup telecast ever recorded in English-language television history.
Sunday’s Argentina-France FIFA World Cup Final averaged a combined 9.2 rating and 22.32 million viewers across FOX (7.0, 16.78 million) and Telemundo (2.2, 5.53 million), figures that include pre-match coverage and do not include streaming. From the start of the match at 10 AM ET, the combined linear audience was 24 million (17.93M on FOX, 6.07M on Telemundo). Approximately 16.8 million people viewed the match, surpassing an audience of 15.4M for the Group Stage match between the U.S. and England that ended in a 0-0 draw. The audience is also much higher than that of 2018’s France vs. Croatia World Cup final in Russia, which was watched by about 12.51M people in the U.S. That was the lowest U.S. audience for a World Cup final since 2002.
Telemundo Deportes’ Spanish-language coverage of the Argentina vs. France match also broke records, averaging about 9M viewers across Telemundo, Peacock and digital platforms. That makes it the most-watched and most-streamed match of the tournament and was up 65% compared to viewership for 2018’s World Cup final (about 5.5M). The game was also the most-streamed match in U.S media history regardless of language with about 3M people viewing on Peacock and other digital platforms.
The World Cup Final ranks as the most-watched non-football sportscast this year. With pre-match coverage included, it ranks third — narrowly trailing the College Football Playoff National Championship in January (22.56M) and the Winter Olympics Super Bowl lead-out in February (22.49M). The match averaged an additional three million viewers on Telemundo’s streaming platforms, including Peacock. The full Telemundo/Peacock audience across TV and streaming was nine million. The linear TV audience peaked at a combined 13.0 rating and 33.34 million in the final quarter-hour of play, as Argentina won on penalty kicks, including a 10.2 and 25.62 million on FOX and a 2.8 and 7.72 million on Telemundo. On FOX, ratings increased by 13% and viewership a whopping 48% from France-Croatia four years ago (6.2, 11.33M).