The UEFA Women’s European Championship 2022 final – a 2-1 England victory against Germany on Sunday – delivered an average audience of 971,000 viewers (P2+), making it the most-watched soccer match on ESPN networks in 2022.

The audience peaked from 2:15-2:30 p.m. during the second half of overtime with 1.2 million viewers.

England-Germany, the match between two soccer rivals, beat the previous high: 732,000 average viewers on Sunday, June 5, who watched the Wales-Ukraine UEFA World Cup qualifying playoff final on ESPN. The #WEURO2022 final is the most-watched women’s soccer match on ESPN networks since May 30, 2015, USA-South Korea match (998,000 viewers).

Top-10 markets: Norfolk (1.2), San Diego (1.0), Washington, DC (1.0), West Palm Beach (1.0), Austin, Texas (0.9), Miami (0.9), Buffalo (0.8), Raleigh-Durham (0.8), Las Vegas 0.8, and Richmond, Va. (0.7).

The 25-day competition capped an unprecedented summer of women’s sports across ESPN platforms, led by the critically-acclaimed “Fifty/50” content initiative.

Tournament Summary:

The 15 UEFA Women’s EURO 2022 group stage match windows on ESPN2 averaged 172,000 viewers, reflecting a 30 percent increase over the comparable time window (M-F 3-5pm; 132,000 viewers in June).

  • Four quarterfinal matches delivered an average audience of 320,000 viewers, an 86 percent increase compared to the group stage average
  • The semifinal matches averaged 326,000 viewers.

Top 5 #WEURO2022 matches:

Date
Match
Viewers (P2+)
Sun, Jul 31
England vs. Germany (Final)
971,000
Wed, Jul 20
England vs. Spain (Quarterfinal)
362,000
Sat, Jul 23
France vs. Netherlands (Quarterfinal)
359,000
Wed, Jul 27
Germany vs. France (Semifinal)
336,000
Tue, Jul 26
England vs. Sweden (Semifinal)
315,000

 

Front Row Soccer editor Michael Lewis has covered 13 World Cups (eight men, five women), seven Olympics and 25 MLS Cups. He has written about New York City FC, New York Cosmos, the New York Red Bulls and both U.S. national teams for Newsday and has penned a soccer history column for the Guardian.com. Lewis, who has been honored by the Press Club of Long Island and National Soccer Coaches Association of America, is the former editor of BigAppleSoccer.com. He has written seven books about the beautiful game and has published ALIVE AND KICKING The incredible but true story of the Rochester Lancers. It is available at Amazon.com.