<p>England’s Premier League has leapfrogged Mexico’s Liga MX as the most popular soccer league in the United States, per a recent <a href="https://worldsoccertalk.com/tv/premier-league-is-now-the-most-watched-soccer-league-in-usa-20231228-WST-478701.html">report</a>. As a result, the ranking of the most popular soccer leagues in the United States has dramatically changed.</p>



<p>The best way to measure the popularity of any given sports league is to base it on the number of people watching the games. Therefore, we’ve accumulated the TV and streaming viewership as reported by Nielsen as well as numbers shared by broadcasters and streaming services to find the winners. After all, Americans can watch thousands of soccer games each season, so the competition is quite fierce.</p>



<h2>Most popular soccer leagues in the United States based on viewership</h2>



<p>Based on the data calculated from Nielsen and shared by broadcasters, here are the top eight most-watched soccer leagues in the United States. These rankings are based on overall soccer viewership during the 2023 calendar year:</p>



<ol><li>Premier League</li><li>Liga MX</li><li>Major League Soccer</li><li>LaLiga</li><li>NWSL</li><li>Bundesliga</li><li>Serie A</li><li>Ligue 1</li></ol>



<h2>Gauging the popular soccer leagues in the United States</h2>



<p>The Premier League has only recently usurped the top spot from Liga MX. The Premier League’s recent success in TV viewership has cracked over two million viewers for many regular season games among the league’s traditional ‘big-six’ clubs. In fact, 2023 has been a record year for Premier League viewership in the United States. The <a href="https://worldsoccertalk.com/tv/top-5-most-watched-premier-league-games-in-us-history-20231228-WST-480101.html">top five most-watched Premier League games</a> in US television history all occurred during 2023.</p>



<p>Previously, for decades, Mexico dominated the United States soccer viewership due to the number of Mexican-American fans in the US as well as the ease of accessibility of games across Univision. There are still millions of supporters for clubs such as Club América, Chivas, Cruz Azul, Pumas, and Monterrey. </p>



<p>But 2023 saw a seismic drop in viewership of Liga MX games. For instance, viewership of Liga MX’s 2023 Apertura decreased by 12% compared to 2022. </p>



<p>Still, there’s no doubt that the popularity of both Liga MX and the Premier League in the United States is due to many of their games being available on free over-the-air television. For example, the Premier League’s total viewership for 9 days over the Christmas period was higher than all of MLS’s TV broadcasts in the entirety of 2023. Being on network and cable television still matters when it comes to viewership.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large"><figure class="image"><img loading="lazy" width="1200" height="675" src="https://ds-images.bolavip.com/news/image?src=https://images.worldsoccertalk.com/webp/full/WST_20240110_WST_481080_Liga-MX-Rose-Bowl-1200x675_2f48bb1b.webp&amp;width=1200&amp;height=675" alt="" class="wp-image-481307" srcset="https://worldsoccertalk.cms.futbolsitesnetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2024/01/Liga-MX-Rose-Bowl-1200x675.jpg 1200w, https://worldsoccertalk.cms.futbolsitesnetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2024/01/Liga-MX-Rose-Bowl-300x169.jpg 300w, https://worldsoccertalk.cms.futbolsitesnetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2024/01/Liga-MX-Rose-Bowl-768x432.jpg 768w, https://worldsoccertalk.cms.futbolsitesnetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2024/01/Liga-MX-Rose-Bowl.jpg 1280w" sizes="(max-width: 1200px) 100vw, 1200px"></figure></figure>



<h2>Popularity and streaming</h2>



<p>After the Premier League and Liga MX, there’s no doubt that Major League Soccer is a distant third in the most popular soccer leagues. Lionel Messi’s arrival ballooned the league’s streaming service (MLS Season Pass) to <a href="https://worldsoccertalk.com/tv/mls-season-pass-nearing-1-million-subscribers-per-report-20230724-WST-444953.html">over one million subscribers</a>, which is an impressive statistic on its own. Streaming numbers for individual MLS games have not been made available by the league or Apple.</p>



<p>However, Nielsen has reported that 1.75 million viewers tuned in on Univision to watch Messi’s debut game for Inter Miami. Plus, 815,000 watched the MLS Cup final on FOX. While streaming numbers are unavailable, the TV viewership for the 2023 final was down 58% compared to 2022.</p>



<p>In fourth place among the most popular soccer leagues is LaLiga. The Spanish top-flight league benefits from several games per week being televised across ESPN Deportes, which is consistently generating roughly 150,000 viewers per match. That consistency in addition to all of the games streamed on ESPN+, as well as superclubs Barcelona and Real Madrid, puts LaLiga ahead of NWSL.</p>



<h2>The growth of NWSL</h2>



<p>While last year’s el Clásico in LaLiga pulled 538,000 viewers on ESPN Deportes (not including ESPN+), the NWSL has experienced growth, and it is making a conscious effort to expand with new teams lining up in the San Francisco Bay area, Boston, and Utah. The <a href="https://twitter.com/CBSSportsGang/status/1724474306040627660" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">last two NWSL</a> finals <a href="https://worldsoccertalk.com/tv/nwsl-championship-draws-800k-viewers-on-cbs-20231114-WST-469992.html#comments-469992-containter">pulled over 800,000 viewers</a>. The final appearances of Ali Krieger and Megan Rapinoe helped that figure. The only thing that keeps it behind LaLiga in these standings is the presence of Real Madrid and Barcelona. Those two clubs have games available on ESPN Deportes, and fans regularly tune into games that do not even grab headlines.</p>



<p>Outside of the NWSL finals on network television, viewership of NWSL games is growing but finds itself well behind the other leagues.</p>



<p>Meanwhile, the Bundesliga and Serie A find most of its games on streaming. ESPN+ and Paramount+ typically do not make viewership numbers accessible. However, ESPN put a recent Dortmund-Leipzig game on ABC, where just over 400,000 fans tuned in. </p>



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<div class="ck-youtube"><iframe loading="lazy" title="NBC&apos;s Premier League TV Coverage - Behind The Scenes With Rebecca Lowe, Kyle Martino &amp; The 2 Robbies" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/-La4imXf63c?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen=""></iframe></div>
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<p>Combining all of the soccer TV and streaming viewership together in 2023, the Premier League represents <a href="https://twitter.com/HelltownBeer/status/1745126322647494815" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">30% of all viewership</a>. Liga MX follows closely behind at 23%. </p>



<p>The remaining leagues hover around 1% (or lower) of all viewership.</p>



<p><em>PHOTOS: IMAGO</em>.</p>

Most popular soccer leagues in the United States

American soccer fans may disagree about who they deem as the most popular leagues in the United States, but the numbers don't lie.

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<p>Wrexham is currently one of the biggest talking points in US sport. So much so that the fifth division Welsh soccer team is surpassing MLS in popularity, according to data made available by Google. </p>



<p>For 2023 to date in the United States, Wrexham is pulling in relatively more searches in Google than Major League Soccer. Despite the 2023 season of MLS kicking off around two months ago, Wrexham’s success in earning promotion has captivated American audiences. Google Trends, a service that compares searches across Google, reveals that <a href="https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=2023-01-01%202023-12-31&amp;geo=US&amp;q=wrexham,MLS&amp;hl=en-US&amp;hl=en&amp;tz=240" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Wrexham surpasses MLS in popularity</a> at many points. </p>



<p>So far this year, there are two major spikes in the popular times for Wrexham compared to MLS. One of those was in late January, and the other was in the middle of April. The former was when <a href="https://worldsoccertalk.com/news/sheffield-utd-eliminates-wrexham-from-fa-cup-in-stoppage-time-20230207-WST-419017.html">Wrexham played Sheffield United</a> in the FA Cup in two thrilling cup ties. More recently, <a href="https://worldsoccertalk.com/news/wrexham-faces-several-challenges-in-its-return-to-league-two-20230430-WST-430790.html">Wrexham secured promotion</a> to <a href="https://worldsoccertalk.com/news/60-70-americans-flock-to-wrexhams-turf-pub-every-day-20230427-WST-430541.html">rousing support</a> both in Wales and in the United States.</p>



<p>Searches for ‘Wrexham’ in the United States this year surged on two occasions. Both of those, comparatively speaking, exceeded the maximum searches for MLS as a soccer league in 2023. Note that MLS did average more searches from mid-February through early April. However, the aforementioned spikes buoyed the Welsh club’s average to surpass that of MLS this year. Moreover, the incomplete data for the end of April shows that Wrexham far exceeds that of MLS. </p>



<p>Worryingly for MLS, the metrics show that the league has plateaued in recent weeks based on people searching for more information about the top-fight American league.</p>



<h2>Wrexham beats MLS on popular Google searches</h2>



<p>In many ways, Wrexham has been the talk of the soccer world in the United States. Much of that credit goes to its Hollywood owners who invested heavily in creating a historically successful squad. That success on the field and off with the <em>Welcome to Wrexham</em> documentary has <a href="https://worldsoccertalk.com/news/wrexham-are-more-famous-in-us-than-clubs-outside-top-10-20230426-WST-430207.html">Wrexham more popular than some MLS clubs</a>. With Wrexham planning a US tour this summer with a set of friendlies against Manchester United and Chelsea, the Red Dragons are fighting for exposure against American clubs.</p>



<p><em><a href="https://theathletic.com/4477037/2023/05/01/wrexham-mls/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">The Athletic</a> </em>published a story that discusses how well Wrexham would do in the 29-team MLS campaign. Wrexham would have to significantly over perform to hang around in Major League Soccer. Not only does every MLS team exceed Wrexham in squad strength, but MLS is ranked higher than every English Pyramid division except for the Premier League. That includes the Championship, which is two leagues higher than Wrexham’s next League.</p>



<p>Despite the relatively lower quality, Wrexham makes a case for being more popular than MLS. Owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney plan to use that popularity to get the club into the Premier League sometime down the road.</p>



<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<div class="ck-twitter"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true"><p lang="cy" dir="ltr">&apos;Whether it takes five years, whether it takes 20 years, that&apos;s the goal.&apos;<br><br>Mewn cyfweliad arbennig gyda <a href="https://twitter.com/MaxineERHughes?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@MaxineERHughes</a> i <a href="https://twitter.com/S4C?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@S4C</a> mae <a href="https://twitter.com/VancityReynolds?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@VancityReynolds</a> a <a href="https://twitter.com/RMcElhenney?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@RMcElhenney</a> yn dweud eu bod nhw&apos;n benderfynol o gyrraedd Uwch Gynghrair Lloegr â <a href="https://twitter.com/Wrexham_AFC?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@Wrexham_AFC</a>. <a href="https://t.co/ApzgP2B7Ty">pic.twitter.com/ApzgP2B7Ty</a></p>— Newyddion S4C (@NewyddionS4C) <a href="https://twitter.com/NewyddionS4C/status/1653106406839443591?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 1, 2023</a></blockquote></div><script async="" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
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<p>For Major League Soccer, this could say volumes about the interest in the league. Outside of the MLS Cup Playoffs, interest would generally be the highest at the beginning of the league’s season. Fans are ready to follow league-wide results as they happen. Yet, in the early stages of the 2023 campaign, the league is being outdone by a fifth-tier side in Wales.</p>



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<div class="ck-youtube"><iframe loading="lazy" title="#WREXHAM popularity pushes PRO/REL debate 🇺🇸" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rUm6HJ82g2A?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen=""></iframe></div>
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Based on Google searches in the beginning of 2023, Wrexham is surpassing MLS based on how popular each is in the United States.

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Most popular soccer leagues in the United States

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Wrexham outshines MLS in US soccer searches