As Artificial Intelligence (AI) has rapidly improved in efficiency and effectiveness in recent years, it is becoming an increasingly essential tool in the sports industry. Like most sectors, sport is seeking to harness AI to maximize its benefits for years to come.
With its scale and resources, the Premier League is among the sports properties exploring how to use AI most effectively. Fans have already seen continued integration in live matches through ball tracking, support for VAR decisions, and semi-automated offside technology, as the league explores AI to enhance the quality of soccer delivered to fans.
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From a league perspective, the Premier League has two active AI-related partnerships in 2026: Adobe and Microsoft. Its multi-year agreement with Adobe, the official digital fan experience partner, aims to enhance the league’s fantasy gaming offering.
The official Fantasy Premier League game has more than 11 million registered players, underscoring its popularity as a fan engagement channel. The partnership with Adobe is intended to enable greater creativity and improved social sharing through the platform.
The Premier League’s partnership with Microsoft, the official cloud and AI partner, aims to maximize the value of the League’s 30+ years of archives. Using Microsoft Azure AI and Copilot, the Premier League is leveraging advanced analytics and search capabilities to deliver enhanced fan experiences through the Premier League app.
Through the app, fans can ask natural-language questions, and the AI will scan the archives to provide detailed insights, analysis, and relevant content. Collectively, these partnerships support a sophisticated technology roadmap that strengthens the league’s capabilities and helps it stay current with emerging innovation.
Premier League clubs are also seeking to be at the forefront of the AI revolution. Advanced technologies are being used across clubs on a daily basis to save time, improve accuracy, and deepen understanding. Current club-level applications include using player-tracking data to predict and better prevent injuries, expanding and improving talent scouting through global databases, and producing analytical breakdowns to support match planning and preparation.
Examples of how Premier League teams are placing AI at the forefront of their ambitions include Manchester United’s appointment of Mike Sansoni as director of data. Sansoni joined the club in 2025 after 11 years with the Mercedes F1 team and was tasked with transforming the club’s capabilities in data and AI.
By recruiting personnel with Formula One experience, the club aims to leverage expertise from a sport that has integrated technology and AI at the heart of its operations.
In terms of capitalizing on new opportunities to better engage fans, Manchester City and its kit supplier, PUMA, launched an AI kit design platform in December 2024. The platform allows fans to design the club’s third kit for the 2026/27 season.
Powered by DEEPOBJECTS, the tool uses generative AI to enable custom kit design options through text prompts and other customization features.
From a sponsorship perspective, AI-based partnerships remain in their relative infancy. This is reflected in the outlook for the 2026/27 season, with only three AI-specific deals in the league. Combined, these agreements place the annual value of AI-focused partnerships at $22.60 million for the upcoming campaign.
A further six teams are linked to partnerships that provide AI-powered tools as part of the agreement, but not as its central focus. These additional deals are worth a further $28.96 million per season.
| Team | AI primary focused sponsors |
|---|---|
| Chelsea FC | IFS (Front-of-shirt partner) Legora (Training shirt partner) |
| Fulham | Harvey |
| Team | Sponsors providing AI-powered tools |
|---|---|
| Brentford | Strider Technologies |
| Chelsea FC | AiScout; FPT (Sleeve partner) |
| Crystal Palace | Temporal (Front-of-shirt partner) |
| Fulham | Arwen AI |
| Liverpool | SAS |
| Nottingham Forest | Ideagen (Sleeve partner) |
| Tottenham Hotspur | Salesforce |
Across these AI-capable partnerships, five include on-kit branding rights, highlighting these brands’ interest in the most valuable rights in the market. Brands such as IFS, Legora, and Harvey are B2B companies seeking to position themselves as leaders in the professional services sector.
However, these partnerships are not being pursued solely for the global visibility they provide; they also offer an opportunity to integrate systems and build infrastructure with leading sports properties. That said, the global exposure gives these brands a chance to raise their international profile and advance their commercial interests through hospitality and ticket offerings.
By aligning with a Premier League club, a brand gains exposure across major UK cities, such as London and Manchester, where much of its business is conducted, while also fostering an emotional connection with business decision-makers.
As clubs look to better integrate AI into their operations, we can expect the sponsorship landscape to continue to expand. As shown by IFS’s deal with Chelsea, AI-based brands have the financial capacity to compete at the premium end of the market, representing a significant potential growth area for Premier League clubs.
This is particularly relevant in the coming seasons, with the league enforcing its ban on gambling-related front-of-shirt partnerships from the start of the 2026/27 season. Last season, gambling front-of-shirt sponsorships covered 11 Premier League teams, leaving clubs under pressure to replace the high-value deals gambling brands have provided in recent years. Crystal Palace is one such club and has moved in this direction with Temporal, an AI software firm that will also integrate its cloud technology across the club. At the time of writing, four of the eight clubs still in the Premier League that were sponsored by gambling brands last season have not announced replacement shirt sponsors. This highlights the opportunity for a more diverse mix of shirt partners from next season. Even if AI brands do not enter the market immediately, the sector’s rapid growth could drive increased interest in the coming seasons.
