With the United States and Canada not playing in the ongoing 2018 soccer World Cup in Russia, Mexico represents North America’s biggest draw.
The El Tri didn’t disappoint (except for losing 3-0), with the June 27 streaming presentation Mexico vs. Sweden in group play generating a record 1 million concurrent live streams on digital devices across TelemundoDeportes.com, the Telemundo Deportes En Vivo app, and the NBC Sports app.
Despite the loss, Mexico (and Sweden) advances to the elimination round following defending champion Germany’s 2-0 loss to South Korea.
The digital tally was the most for any event in NBC Sports Digital history, excluding Super Bowls, and the only event other than the Super Bowl to hit the 1 million mark.
Fox Sports has exclusive U.S. broadcast rights to Russia 2018. Telemundo is owned by Comcast, which is attempting to acquire 20thCentury Fox Film.
In addition, the 1.02 million concurrent livestreams topped by 53% the prior non-Super Bowl mark – 665,000 for the Mexico-South Korea match on June 23.
On June 26, the World Cup reached 3.2 million unique digital users and generated 106 million minutes viewed. To date, the quadrennial tournament has reached 9.3 million total unique users and generated 89.1 million livestreams and 1.35 billion total minutes viewed, averaging 2.0 million livestreams per match.
Notably, Argentina’s last-minute win over Nigeria, which advanced the Lionel Messi-led squad to the second round, delivered an average of 2.85 million streaming viewers – ranking as Telemundo Deportes’ most-watched weekday match through June 26.
Telemundo delivered its best-ever June 26 daytime (7 a.m.-5 p.m. ET), averaging 1.58 million digital viewers for its World Cup coverage – topping the prior record set June 20 by 41% (1.12 million).