Hydration Break Math
The 2026 World Cup is the largest tournament since it began back in 1930.
A new format has expanded to 48 teams and 104 matches over 39 days (there were only 32 teams and 64 matches in the 2022 World Cup, for reference).
Also, something new this year is called “Hydration Breaks” - a 3-minute break during each half for “player welfare” and to deal with the “extreme heat” of North America matches.
But let’s call a spade a spade...
These are the fittest athletes in the world and several stadiums are temperature and weather controlled.
Hydration breaks are really an opportunity to sell advertisements, and the numbers are pretty massive on how much a broadcasting company could be making.
So we have 104 matches and a total of 208 hydration breaks throughout the World Cup.
There can be a total of 4 ads for 30 seconds during each hydration break.
208 hydration breaks X 4 advertisements = 832 total advertisements
Costs are estimated around $200,000 to $300,000 for 30 second ads - but up to $750,000 when the US team is playing.
Costs will also increase as we get further into the tournament - up to as high as $1 to $2 million per advertisement.
For simple math calculations, let’s be moderate and say $300,000 per advertisement across all 832 opportunities.
$300,000 per advertisement X 832 advertisements = $249,600,000
Comfortably call that $250 million in advertising revenue. 🤯
And again, that amount is likely on the low end.
Fox also paid FIFA $485 million for the broadcasting rights to every game.
So yeah, there's a lot of money involved with this soccer tournament!
How far do you think Team USA makes it this year?