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Last year, rights to NFL Sunday Ticket were up for grabs. DIRECTV, who had the service since it launched in the ’90s, wasn’t interested in keeping it, so that led to a bidding war. Which Google won. Putting NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV and YouTube Primetime channels, starting this NFL season.
Now that the NFL Sunday Ticket has been available on YouTube and YouTube TV for about a quarter of the season, we’re starting to hear some numbers about subscribers, and it’s not looking good. According to Antenna, NFL Sunday Ticket has only drawn in about 1.3 million customers this season. Estimates indicate that Google would need to get about 4.5 million customers to make the deal for NFL Sunday Ticket profitable.
What’s even more interesting is that, this is only a 100,000 increase over what DIRECTV had in its final season of NFL Sunday Ticket. So making the package easier to access, hasn’t resulted in a lot more people signing up for it, apparently.
But it’s not all bad news for YouTube TV, as about 41% of those that signed up for NFL Sunday Ticket are new to YouTube TV. Meaning that YouTube TV as a whole is growing because of NFL Sunday Ticket. Which is the real reason for Google wanting it.
NFL Sunday Ticket is expensive, and doesn’t include local games
The number of subscribers that NFL Sunday Ticket has should not be a surprise. After all, NFL Sunday Ticket does not include local games, nor primetime games. But every other game on Sunday. Which means it’s really only for those die-hard NFL fans that want to watch every single game. And not just watch highlights on YouTube after the fact.
Of course, the price has something to do with it too. NFL Sunday Ticket is not cheap, starting at $349 for the season on YouTube TV. A big reason for that is the deals that NFL has with CBS and FOX for showing local games. It has to cost more, hence the much higher price here. That works out to about $112.25 per month for four months – which YouTube does let you pay for it in monthly payments.