Peacock World Cup streaming numbers are crushing it

Streaming is one of the biggest success stories of World Cup 2022, so far. In particular, Peacock World Cup streaming has gone through the roof with an incredible number of sports fans watching games online.

Several World Cup 2022 games have broken streaming records. For instance, Argentina against Mexico is the most-streamed World Cup game ever. It is the first World Cup game to top two million viewers. Similarly, no other soccer game in US history has had greater streaming numbers than that one. Other worthy mentions include USA versus Iran (1.1 million viewers), USA-Wales (1 million) and Poland against Mexico (1.35 million). And those are just streaming numbers.

In the first week of its World Cup coverage, streaming has comprised 26% of Telemundo’s total viewership, which is an unprecedented number. After week one, Peacock and Telemundo’s streaming platforms are averaging 673,000 viewers per World Cup game. That’s an increase of 209% compared to World Cup 2018.

Peacock executive shares insight on numbers

World Soccer Talk spoke earlier this week with Rick Cordella, who is the President of Programming for NBC Sports and Peacock Sports.

“In terms of the previous World Cup, [World Cup 2022] is blowing it out of the water,” said Cordella. “Generally, every time we have one of these World Cups or Olympics, a four year gap, you really see the difference.”

With a price point of $4.99 per month combined with 180 Premier League games per season, Peacock’s success story makes sense for a lot of soccer fans. Every single game of the 2022 FIFA World Cup is streaming live and on-demand via Peacock Premium.

Peacock’s success, in particular, during the World Cup is even more remarkable when you consider that every broadcast is in Spanish-language. Even though rival FOX has the exclusive English-language rights in the United States, the broadcaster doesn’t have a direct-to-consumer streaming service for cord cutters. In spite of this, their lack of a streaming focus has seen them net significant gains on television.

Reasons for Peacock’s successful World Cup numbers

World Cup 2022 has been the World Cup of surprises both on and off the pitch.

We asked Cordella his thoughts about the audience share for streaming compared to linear (ie traditional television), and what he owes Peacock’s World Cup success to.

“We are the only place from a direct-to-consumer point where you can get these games,” Cordella explained. “I’m sure you’ve watched a lot of Spanish-language games in your life as a big soccer fan, and people are okay with watching in Spanish. Andrés Cantor is one of the best soccer announcers in the world. Listening to him call a match, whether you can fully comprehend Spanish or not, it kind of doesn’t matter.

“The other part is that the Hispanic demographics ends up leaning more towards streaming. The younger audience probably helped as well.

“The last part is the dayparts. You start with weekday morning games where people may not be able to get in front of their TV sets, so you see a disproportionate amount of people on mobile devices.”

A key to Peacock World Cup streaming numbers

We asked Cordella how much of an impact English-language viewers are having on Peacock’s World Cup streaming numbers.

“We’re still diving in [to the numbers],” said Cordella. “[Another point I have about the success of Peacock] is Premier League. The fact that we are the home of Premier League soccer exclusively, for many games, on Peacock.

“We already have a soccer fandom that exists on our platform, that is able to just flip over and watch the World Cup during the Premier League break.”

Eight days after the World Cup final ends, the Premier League soccer schedule returns on Peacock.