Irish public service broadcaster RTE has secured free-to-air rights to the 2030 FIFA World Cup, the centenary edition of soccer’s flagship national teams tournament, days after completing its coverage of the 2026 edition.
The new agreement will see RTE continue to provide Irish audiences with FTA coverage of the 2030 tournament, which will be staged in six host nations across its linear television, streaming, radio, and digital platforms.
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The rights package also includes rights to air the Republic of Ireland’s qualification campaign as it attempts to become one of the 48 teams to win a place in the tournament.
As a nod to the World Cup's first edition in 1930, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Argentina will host one opening-round match each, while the rest of the showpiece event will be staged across Spain, Portugal, and Morocco.
Uruguay staged and won the inaugural edition, while Argentina was runner-up. Paraguay has been given hosting rights as the home of Conmebol, the only continental governing body that existed at the time.
The announcement comes two days after RTE completed its coverage of the 2026 edition, held across the US, Mexico, and Canada, which saw Spain crowned champions after defeating Argentina in extra time.
The final game generated over 1.4 million streams on the RTE Player to become the most-streamed single event in the platform’s history, with an extra one million watching the game live on linear channel RTE2.
RTE director general Kevin Bakhurst said: “We are delighted that RTÉ has been successful in securing rights to the 2030 FIFA World Cup for Irish audiences after what has been a very successful 2026 World Cup with record numbers of people enjoying RTÉ's coverage.
“The huge number of streams on RTÉ Player throughout the tournament has been one of our big success stories this year and has highlighted the value of our investment in the service in recent years.
“Live sport – free to air – continues to provide national moments and conversations – enjoyment and entertainment to Irish audiences – paid for by your licence fee, public funding and commercial revenue.”
Across the whole tournament, RTE Player secured 23.4 million streams – a significant jump from the 8.5 million streams the platform delivered during the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.
Several matches drew strong audience figures for RTE, including England’s semi-final loss against Argentina, which saw a television audience of 949,000 and one million streams on RTE Player.
The other semi-final between France and Spain delivered an average audience of 873,000 on linear television and a further one million streams on RTE Player.
England’s win over Norway in the knockout stage also drew strong viewership, attracting an average television audience of 787,000 and one million streams.
Meanwhile, across RTE Sport Online and RTE Sport social channels, there were 91 million video views during the tournament, including over 6.8 million views of highlights and analysis on the RTE Sport YouTube channel.
Given the late-night and early morning kick-off times in Ireland for some games, highlights of the tournament generated 1.6 million streams on RTE Player, while other FIFA World Cup content, including clips and RTE’s Up All Night podcast, secured 345,000 additional streams on the platform.
The rights add to RTE’s soccer portfolio, which includes rights to broadcast all games involving the Ireland Women’s national team through the 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup, including the 2026 UEFA Nations League, international friendlies, and World Cup qualifiers.
The FTA broadcaster also secured a rights package for the UEFA Champions League, the top-tier pan-European men’s club competition, from 2027 to 2031, which includes first pick live matches on Wednesday nights and the final, as well as the UEFA Super Cup.
The announcement also comes as other broadcasters look to quickly secure their rights for the 2030 World Cup following this year’s tournament, with German telecoms giant Deutsche Telekom also announcing its rights acquisition for the next edition yesterday.
As part of its announcement, Telekom said it had drawn a record 200 million viewers for its coverage of the 2026 World Cup – more than three times the audience it secured for the UEFA Euro 2024, which attracted 70 million.
