FIFA Joins Streaming Wars With Own Digital Platform for Live Football Games, Original Content
The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA), the leading international body that governs football, has announced the launch of FIFA Plus, a new digital streaming platform for live games and original content.
According to Variety, the subscription platform plans to stream 40,000 live games per year from 100 FIFA members associations, including lesser-represented men, women and youth competitions from around the world. At launch, up to 1,400 matches will be livestreamed on the platform each month, a number that could grow moving forward.
What’s more, the platform looks to launch with more than 2,000 hours of archive content, featuring matches from every men and women’s World Cup ever recorded. It’ll additionally include original content, ranging from documentaries, docuseries, talk shows and shorts. Subscribers can also get the latest news and statistics directly from the platform.
“FIFA Plus represents the next step in our vision to make football truly global and inclusive, and it underpins FIFA’s core mission of expanding and developing football globally,” said FIFA President Gianni Infantino. “It will accelerate the democratisation of football and we are delighted to share it with fans.”
The platform is now available globally on the web and mobile devices. And it’s currently ad-supported and free. The plan, however, is to eventually operate on a subscription-based model, depending on how the platform is received by football fans.
It’s worth noting though that, as of right now, games from the major European league can’t be live streamed yet. The same could be said for the forthcoming 2022 World Cup games in Qatar later this year.
“There is no plan to have premium World Cup live rights on the platform today,” FIFA Director of Strategy and Corporate Development Charlotte Burr told Variety.
This means that – at least for the moment – FIFA has to continue to work with broadcast partners with regards to letting the public catch big matches. And this makes a lot of sense, given how broadcast agreements and deals have likely been already inked out. Plus, these games can generate a lot of revenue – FIFA, of course, won’t give them away for free.
The purpose of launching FIFA Plus is supposedly to grow the organisation’s reach across the globe, as Burr points out. “Our 100% focus is on reach, we can’t achieve our development ambitions and our business model if it isn’t extending reach,” she said.
FIFA, the leading international body that governs football, has announced the launch of FIFA Plus, a new digital streaming platform for live games and original content.
The platform features live games from lesser-represented competitions around the world as well as full-length documentaries and talk shows, among other original and archive content.
It's currently available ad-supported and free. However, it could shift to a subscription-based model in the future.
Matches from major European leagues and this year's World Cup in Qatar can't be livestreamed on the platform.