Flag Football World Championships underscore opportunities ahead of LA28

As we wrote in February, flag football participation is surging at the youth level, particularly for girls. There are more opportunities for girls to play flag compared to tackle football, and athletes (and their parents) are drawn to it as a “safer” option. Let’s look at the numbers that support the sport’s grassroots success:

🏈 In 2023, hundreds of thousands of girls aged six to 17 play flag football in the U.S., while high school girls’ participation rose 105% from 2023 to 2024.

🏆 Twenty-four states have officially sanctioned girls’ flag football state championships — including Rhode Island, as of Monday — and 16 more are running pilot programs on the path to sanctioning the sport.

🏫 It’s catching on in the NCAA too: Flag football is a member of the org’s Emerging Sports for Women program and is on a fast track to championship sport status. More than 100 NCAA schools will offer it this coming year.

Crucially, the NFL has thrown its weight behind flag football at every level, adding an air of legitimacy to the sport and supercharging its growth. It runs a network of youth leagues for girls and boys, supports organizations like Females in Flag, and even gave girls’ flag teams the spotlight during last season’s Super Bowl Week.

• NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said that getting girls in the game is a long-term investment in the league’s future — people who played football as kids are more likely to be fans as adults, and he believes creating opportunities for girls will make them football lovers for life.

• The NFL’s support has also drawn high-profile partnerships to flag football, with brands like Toyota and Gatorade investing in the youth movement.

Youth participation is just one facet of the strategy. To become a force in the sports world and build anticipation ahead of its Olympic debut at LA28, flag football also needs to capture adults’ attention and build fandom here and now. And last weekend’s Flag Football World Championships in Germany showed the sport is on its way.

• The Olympic qualifier event achieved record global broadcast distribution, reaching 180M potential viewers through a network of platforms. The event also brought 20K fans to watch IRL at a flag football–specific complex in Düsseldorf. That’s a lot of eyeballs.

NFL Flag, the NFL’s aforementioned youth flag football program, also is drawing some impressive viewership numbers. Last month’s girls’ and boys’ championships reached 14.3M people, with the girls’ title game breaking the league’s all-time record with 1.12M average viewers. Clearly, this isn’t just any kids’ sporting event — there’s a robust emerging fandom across skill levels.

That’s why the NFL has gone big on flag at the pro level, too: The league partnered with TMRW Sports — a start-up co-founded by golf legends Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy and sports exec Mike McCarley — to develop a pro league for women and men in the lead-up to LA28.

• Investors include prominent women’s tennis greats Billie Jean King, Serena Williams, and Ilana Kloss, plus retired USWNT and NWSL star Alex Morgan and several huge NFL names…not to mention some private equity giants.

• The bet? Flag football isn’t just a youth movement creating the flag fans of tomorrow — it’s a legitimate draw for adult consumers right now, despite a crowded sports market. Brands like Under Armour and Invisalign have known this, and that’s why they’re all in.

Brands remain bullish on flag — since we published that article in February, major players like Nike and Exos have gotten in the game, and others have deepened their commitment. The strong results from last month’s NFL Flag championships and last week’s Flag Football World Championships will only draw more interest: They’ve demonstrated a market that’s ripe for the picking.

• Any brands planning their pre–LA28 marketing should consider getting behind big flag football names like Diana Flores, Ashlea Klam, and Ashley Docking — unlike many Olympic sports where athletes share the spotlight for three weeks every four years, flag stars have the potential to become enduring household names.

As the NFL and other brands buying into flag football seek to grow and deepen the fandom, women are a prime target. The sport, as we mentioned, is already extremely popular with girls, and there’s potential to build on the NFL’s recent success with women.

• Reports show that women make up 47% of today’s NFL fans, the result of grassroots fandom combined with the league’s concerted effort to appeal to women (example A: It partnered with us). Women fans being a huge growth engine for an emerging sport? No surprises there.