10/12/24
How Much Money does College Football Make?
Author: Miles Solomon
Editor: David Sun
College football is a major revenue driver for many universities across the U.S. The sport generates income through media rights deals, sponsorships, ticket sales, and merchandising. Schools are often inclined to invest in their college football programs, as it attract more attention and applications to their universities. When watching 18-year-olds compete for their respective college teams, it becomes easy to lose grasp of just how big of an industry college football is.
For scale, Major League Baseball (MLB) brought in $11.34 billion in 2024. In the 11-game College Football Playoff (CFP) tournament set to debut this year, television rights are expected to be valued at $2.2 billion. This figure doesn’t account for seat tickets and only represents the final tournament. The $2.2 billion in TV rights doesn’t include the regular season or the other bowl games being played.
The $11.34 billion MLB revenue equates to $378 million per team. In comparison, the University of Texas recently pushed its annual football revenue to an all-time high of $271 million. This figure, though slightly lower than the average MLB team’s revenue, illustrates how significant college football is, even compared to major professional sports leagues. The University of Texas isn’t a football team - it’s an academic institution.
As the College Football Playoff expands and media rights deals grow, the financial impact of college football is set to increase even further, solidifying its status as a critical component of the collegiate sports landscape.