Why World Cup viewers ditched short clips and came back to live TV

Viewers who had grown accustomed to catching sports through highlight clips or text summaries returned to live TV and mobile streams for the North and Central America World Cup, a new survey shows. Analysts attribute the shift to a multi-broadcaster arrangement that expanded the number of channels carrying the matches, which in turn drove a marked increase in real-time viewership.

According to a comparative study on how audiences consume major sporting events, conducted by the Korea Broadcast Advertising Corp. (KOBACO) Media Advertising Research Institute among 1,000 adults, 47.1 percent of respondents watched the World Cup via live television. An additional 6.2 percent caught matches on TV screens at restaurants, bars, cafes or other public venues.

Online live streaming through portal services drew 16.6 percent of viewers — roughly double the 8.6 percent recorded during the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics. By contrast, behaviors prominent during the previous Winter Games fell sharply: only 12.9 percent said they relied solely on short-form clips or digital highlight reels, and just 10.4 percent followed the tournament through text-only news articles or online posts without watching any video.

Unlike the previous Winter Olympics, which JTBC broadcast exclusively, this World Cup was carried jointly by KBS and JTBC — an arrangement that viewers said made matches noticeably easier to access. The institute found that its "channel accessibility" index rose from 3.17 to 3.39 points, while the "public buzz" indicator climbed from 2.43 to 3.03 and the sense of a "national festival atmosphere" increased from 2.34 to 2.88.

Viewer engagement and interest also rose, from 2.36 to 2.97 points, and overall viewing satisfaction improved from 2.89 to 3.26.

The survey also highlighted strong demand for broader, more affordable access to World Cup and Olympic broadcasts. Respondents expressed particularly high agreement with the statements that "international sporting events like the Olympics and World Cup should be available to everyone free of charge" (4.27 points) and that "since the Olympics and World Cup are matters of national interest, everyone should be able to watch them easily regardless of their financial circumstances" (4.21 points).

"This research confirmed just how strong the public's demand for universal access to major sporting events really is," said Kwon Ye-ji, a senior research fellow at the KOBACO Media Advertising Research Institute. "It showed how much it matters to viewer welfare to create an environment where anyone can comfortably watch tournaments that capture the nation's attention."