Ahead of the first World Cup game to be hosted by the United States since 1994, the Sports & Fitness Industry Association (SFIA) issued a special “Soccer Spotlight” report detailing that the U.S. has already seen a surge in soccer participation pre-tournament and will likely see a further bump in the current year.

According to SFIA’s report, the U.S. appears to have benefited from the energy surrounding the event over the past year. In 2025, “outdoor soccer participation reached 16.8 million Americans, up 15.8 percent year-over-year, while indoor soccer participation grew to 6.6 million, climbing 10.5 percent,” according to the trade association.

Alex Kerman, senior director of research and operations at SFIA, wrote in the report, “This is a critical distinction. The United States is not entering the World Cup from a position of stagnation or decline. On the contrary, it is entering from a position of strength.”

Past World Cups’ Influence on U.S. Soccer Participation
However, the study found that the extent to which the World Cup affects participation depends on a variety of factors, including the time of year the games are held and how the U.S. team fares.

Analyzing 15 years of SFIA participation data to see how past tournaments impacted participation, the SFIA found that one consistent pattern was that participation gains often occur after the World Cup, not during it.

For instance, the 2022 Men’s World Cup tournament, held in Qatar during the winter months in the U.S., produced only modest growth that year (outdoor: +3.7 percent, indoor: +1.6 percent). SFIA attributed the weaker participation gains to the games being played from November through December, in the middle of the American fall sports season and far outside the traditional outdoor soccer calendar.
In 2023, however, outdoor soccer participation jumped 8.1 percent and indoor surged 7.5 percent, the largest World Cup bounce seen in the SFIA’s 15-year dataset. SFIA wrote in the study, “People who were inspired by the Qatar tournament in November 2022 appear to have picked up the sport in earnest when the weather and facilities allowed in 2023. The winter timing of the Qatar World Cup appears to have deferred rather than diminished the participation response.”
In 2014, the men’s World Cup in Brazil likewise benefited U.S. soccer participation the following year. SFIA participation data showed that overall outdoor soccer participation declined by 1.1 percent in 2014, continuing the long-term slide that began in 2011. Indoor soccer declined more sharply, falling 5.7 percent.
The decline came despite high interest in the World Cup during play, with Google search data for the term “soccer” reaching its all-time peak during the summer of 2014.
In 2015, the year after the Brazil tournament, indoor soccer rebounded strongly (+6.2 percent) and continued growing in 2016 (+6.3 percent). Outdoor participation was essentially flat in 2015 (+0.4 percent) and then fell again in 2016 (−5.6 percent). SFIA stated in the study, ”The post-Brazil indoor bounce is consistent with a World Cup inspiring new indoor league sign-ups, but the outdoor market did not see the same participation bump.”
Meanwhile, the men’s World Cup in 2018, held in Russia, faced another hurdle when the U.S. team didn’t qualify. Both outdoor (−4.4 percent) and indoor (−3.1 percent) soccer declined in 2018. Google search interest for “soccer” was roughly half what it had been during the 2014 Brazil World Cup peak. The following year (2019) brought modest recovery – outdoor, up 4.5 percent, indoor up 2.0 percent. SFIA wrote in its report, “This pattern is consistent with the hypothesis that U.S. team involvement is a meaningful driver of American soccer participation enthusiasm. Without a national team to follow, the tournament’s galvanizing effect appears substantially reduced.”

The 2026 World Cup offers ideal conditions for boosting World Cup participation. 

The U.S. is competing in the games after earning an automatic bid as co-hosts of the tournament with Canada and Mexico. 

The timing of the games also aligns with the U.S. soccer season, leading to U.S. participation likely receiving an immediate benefit rather than arriving the following year. 

“The 2026 Soccer World Cup presents a fundamentally different set of conditions,” wrote Kerman in the study. “The tournament will be played in the summer, at the height of the outdoor season, and on home soil. For the first time in recent years, the structural barriers that have historically delayed participation may be minimized. This alignment raises an important possibility: that the conversion from spectator to participant could occur not just after the tournament — but during it.” 

The report also highlights key structural shifts in soccer participation: 

  • Women Are Closing the Gap: Women’s soccer participation is growing faster than men’s in both formats. In outdoor soccer, female participants grew 65.5 percent from 2018 to 2025 (4.0 million to 6.7 million), compared to 36.9 percent growth for males. Women’s share of outdoor soccer players rose from 35.2 percent to 39.7 percent over this period. In indoor soccer, women grew by 41.7 percent, compared with 18.3 percent for men, with the female share rising from 31.5 percent to 35.5 percent. A participation rate gap persists — 6.6 percent of American men play outdoor soccer versus 4.2 percent of women — but the directional trend is toward convergence. SFIA said the U.S. women’s team’s multiple World Cup titles likely contributed to increased female participation in soccer and to the growth of women’s professional soccer infrastructure in the U.S.
  • Adult participation (35+) is rising rapidly: Children 6–12 remain the largest single age group in outdoor soccer, but their share had fallen from 40.3 percent of all outdoor soccer players in 2024 to 32.6 percent in 2025, largely because participation among Americans 35 and older is growing faster. SFIA said many adults now playing soccer grew up playing soccer during the sport’s rapid youth expansion in the late 1980s and 1990s and were teenagers during the 1994 World Cup. The rise of adult recreational leagues, walking football, and over-35 competitive leagues, as well as the Premier League’s arrival on American broadcast television in 2013, were also seen as factors supporting adults’ interest in soccer. Participation among adults remains significantly lower than among youth.
  • Hispanic Americans leading growth and engagement: Among all racial and ethnic groups tracked, Hispanic Americans show by far the strongest growth and the highest absolute participation rates. Between 2022 and 2025, Hispanic participation in outdoor soccer grew by 60.4 percent (2.6 million to 4.2 million). Hispanics now account for 24.9 percent of all outdoor soccer players, up from 20.0 percent in 2022. SFIA noted that, for the 2026 World Cup, soccer’s appeal to Hispanics is notable, as many host cities, including Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston, Miami, New York, and Kansas City, have large Hispanic communities. Among other groups, African American/black and Asian/Pacific Islander groups are also seeing healthy growth in soccer participation in recent years. Caucasian/white participation saw the slowest growth of any group, though it remains the largest in absolute terms.
  • Casual participation is growing faster than CORE: “CORE” participants — those who play 26 or more times per year — accounted for 43.6 percent of all outdoor soccer players in 2018. By 2025, that share had fallen to 35.4 percent, even though CORE participants grew in absolute terms (+19.2 percent). Casual players grew far faster (+68.5 percent), pushing their share of total participation from 56.4 percent to 64.6 percent.
  • Regions: Pacific Leads, New England Surges, Sun Belt Grows Fast: The Pacific region (California, Oregon, Washington) has the highest outdoor soccer participation rate of any region at 6.9 percent in 2025, up from 4.4 percent in 2018. This reflects the region’s large Hispanic population, temperate climate, and strong soccer infrastructure. New England showed the largest percentage-point gain of any region since 2018, rising from 3.1 percent to 5.8 percent — a 2.7-percentage-point increase. The West South Central region (Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas) grew significantly, from 3.0 percent to 5.3 percent, with Dallas hosting 2026 World Cup matches likely generating further regional momentum. The East South-Central region (Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi, Tennessee) remains the lowest-participation region.
Image courtesy 2026 World Cup