What the data actually says about MLB and NBA popularity

It is a popular trope on social media these days to argue that Major League Baseball has surpassed the NBA in popularity. But does the actual data agree?

The claims come from all corners of the internet. Some people were simply impressed with the success of the World Baseball Classic. Some are baseball fans who just love their sport. Others are media personalities who don’t like basketball.

Regardless of whether or not these arguments are bad faith, it is worth looking to see what the data actually says.

For many, the World Baseball Classic is the center of these claims. The championship game of the tournament between the United States and Venezuela averaged 10.87 million viewers on Fox and Fox Deportes, more than the average viewership for the 2025 NBA Finals, which was 10.20 million on ABC.

But this alone is not evidence that baseball is more popular than basketball. The do-or-die Game 7 of the 2025 NBA Finals averaged 16.35 million viewers, a healthy bit more than the World Baseball Classic championship.

A reverse argument based on similar numbers could easily be made to argue that basketball is more popular than baseball. The United States-France men’s basketball Olympic championship in 2024 averaged 20.3 million viewers. The last time a full World Series averaged more viewers was in 2016. Though, just like basketball, Game 7 of the 2025 World Series averaged significantly more viewers, drawing 26.88 million on Fox.

These arguments are evidently flawed if they can be used for both sides, and that is before we get to the problems of comparing national team tournaments to club team tournaments. Unlike playoff games, national team tournaments don’t happen every year. A much better apples-to-apples comparison would be NBA Finals and World Series viewership.

So let’s make that comparison.

Between 2010 and 2019, only once did the World Series beat the NBA Finals in viewership. That was the Cubs-Indians World Series in 2016, which delivered over 40 million viewers for Game 7 and saw Chicago end the Curse of the Billy Goat. Otherwise, the comparison isn’t particularly close. The average viewership for the NBA Finals over that span surpassed 15 million each year, something the World Series did only three times.

But things have changed meaningfully after 2019. Since 2020, World Series viewership has topped the NBA in four of six years. Of course, the NBA Finals were pushed back in both 2020 and 2021, which confounds these results.

The starkest differences between World Series and NBA Finals viewership have come in the last two years. The 2024 Celtics-Mavericks NBA Finals averaged 11.11 million and the 2025 Thunder-Pacers NBA Finals averaged 10.20 million. That compares to 15.1 million for Dodgers-Yankees in 2024 and 15.5 million for Dodgers-Blue Jays in 2025.

Markets play a significant role in championship viewership in both the NBA and MLB. It’s one of the reasons why comparisons between them and national team tournaments don’t work. The low Thunder-Pacers viewership, for example, could easily be explained by the small markets the teams play in. Similarly, the Rangers-Diamondbacks 2023 World Series, featuring two smaller baseball markets, averaged 9.1 million viewers. An all-time low.

If MLB continues to dominate the NBA in championship viewership, that would be a clear indication that baseball has surpassed basketball. But such a declaration based on this data is still premature.

Instead, many have pointed to NBA and MLB regular-season viewership, suggesting that the NBA is in decline while MLB is on the rise. Despite what some have argued, both the NBA and MLB have seen viewership increases during recent regular seasons.

At the All-Star break, NBA games on NBC were averaging 2.6 million viewers, up 97% from comparable windows last year on TNT. ESPN and ABC were averaging 2.06 million viewers, up 18%. Prime Video was averaging 1.06 million, down 7% from comparable windows on ESPN last year.

Baseball saw similar increases last year. Sunday Night Baseball on ESPN in 2025 averaged 1.8 million viewers, up 21% from 2024. Baseball Night in America on Fox averaged 2.04 million viewers, up 9%.

But comparing national viewership between the NBA and MLB isn’t exactly an apples-to-apples endeavor. MLB viewership is much more localized compared to the NBA.

In 2025, the Yankees had 26 games nationally televised. That’s about 16% of their games and includes instances when the team appeared on TBS (which blacks out games in the local market) and FS1 (which airs in addition to the local broadcast). In the 2024-25 NBA season, the Knicks appeared on national television 24 times. The fewer games in an NBA season means that 29% of Knicks games were nationally televised.

NBA fans are far more conditioned to watch national TV games of their favorite team because they have far fewer regional-only games.

National MLB games on FS1 averaged just 324,000 viewers last season. TBS averaged 462,000 viewers. These figures show MLB fans are simply accustomed to watching their local broadcast, or fine with skipping a game that isn’t televised locally.

So, while the NBA seemingly has an edge in terms of national viewership, albeit not an especially large one, comparing national TV viewership (or local TV viewership) is not a great way to compare these leagues.

We can also look at survey data to try and parse out which league is more popular.

An S&P Global survey from June 2025 found that 29% of Americans reported watching MLB and 24% reported watching the NBA. That is larger than the 1.9% margin of error for the survey. On the other hand, a 2024 Ampere Analysis survey found that only 9% of people said baseball was their favorite sport, compared to 17% who said basketball.

The dramatically different responses to these questions, framed very differently, suggests that even survey data can’t answer our question perfectly.

So, what was the point of this exercise?

Viewership data is far from infallible, and those using it to make an argument about which league is more popular should use caution. It is very easy to shape the available data whichever way best fits the chosen narrative.

The NBA generally averages more regular season viewers, but that could easily be a product of higher local MLB viewership, and MLB has narrowed and arguably surpassed the NBA in championship viewership.

What the overall data does show is that there is not a dramatic difference. Anyone arguing otherwise is either working from a much narrower slice of data, or is simply looking to push an agenda.