The 2026 World Cup is not only testing fans’ passion, but also their spending power. The first World Cup with 48 teams, spread across the United States, Mexico and Canada, has turned following a national team into a financial operation that can involve dynamic ticketing, domestic flights, hotel nights, rentals, resale markets, credit cards, personal sacrifices and family decisions. For many supporters, going to the World Cup means delaying major life plans in order to see their team. For some, it will look like madness; for others, the dream of a lifetime. What seems clear is that paying certain sums for a World Cup match now goes beyond the usual limits and turns the experience into a privilege for many, and a major sacrifice for many others.
The extreme case is Sebastian Reader, a 28-year-old England fan who, in an interview with Reuters from Dallas, explained that he arrived in the United States with a budget of around £30,000, about $40,000, to follow England during the tournament. His plan is not to attend one match, but to follow the team across different host cities, spend more than $12,000 on tickets alone and delay personal decisions such as buying a home. “It has always been a dream to see England at a major tournament, especially the World Cup,” said Reader, who moved back in with his parents to save money and described the trip as “the biggest experience” of his life: “In my head, it’s a big investment.”
Even the cheap ticket comes with sacrifices
At the other end is Worchihan Zingkhai, a teacher and content creator from India whose story was told in a first-person piece by Business Insider. He wanted to see Portugal, England or Argentina, but ended up buying two $140 tickets for Czechia-South Africa because the more attractive matches were beyond his budget. In his account, he explained that he had to choose “the match he could afford”, rather than the one he had imagined when planning his first World Cup trip. To make the journey possible, he also postponed buying a laptop worth more than $2,000.
The pattern repeats across very different profiles. Rory Phillips-Hunter, a 37-year-old Scotland fan, told the same outlet that he ended up using a credit card, changing cars and reorganising his entire trip in order to follow Scotland. His annual salary is around £33,000, about $44,000, and a stay in Boston for two people could have reached around $8,000, so he eventually looked for alternatives in Providence. “Travelling to America is expensive,” he explained, before finding in a WhatsApp group of Scottish fans a way to reduce accommodation and transport costs.
Following a team or paying for an experience
The case of Houssam Jeboni shows the cost from a very different economy. According to The Guardian, the 33-year-old Moroccan fishmonger estimated that he would spend around $6,000 to follow Morocco during the group stage, from New Jersey to Foxborough and Atlanta, before returning home via Miami. In the same report, another Moroccan supporter summed up the feeling that can justify the expense: “Seeing my team has no price.” Jeboni’s figure is close to Morocco’s average annual salary, estimated at around $7,400.
The World Cup has also created a line between following a team and buying a one-off experience. Oli Lee, a music producer from Kent based in Los Angeles, told The Guardian that he paid $800 for a ticket to watch England-Croatia in Dallas. “I’ve never been to a World Cup game before, so I thought it was something I couldn’t miss,” he explained. In the same piece, Lee Williams, a fan from south London, described a route through Los Angeles, Mexico and Dallas with a cost that was hard to absorb: “The cost is astronomical; I’ve been scared to look at my bank account in the mornings.” His conclusion was direct: “I’m going home to work to pay for what I’ve spent here.”
The World Cup and an event for the rich
The paradox is that the expensive World Cup is not only affecting those who cross oceans. In a series of fan testimonies published by The Guardian before the tournament, one Atlanta resident estimated that taking his wife and two children to a group-stage match could cost around $2,000. “I’m much less excited than I was in 1994, when the World Cup was held in the United States,” he explained. “Now it feels like an event for the wealthy.” Daniel Maldonado, in Mexico, appeared in a live report by Associated Press outside the Azteca Stadium, wearing a shirt and carrying a flag, among the fans who could not afford a ticket but still wanted to feel part of the tournament from the street.
Price has not been the only problem. Bina Ramroop bought $485 tickets on StubHub to take her grandson to Spain-Cape Verde in Atlanta, but the tickets were never transferred to the Fédération Internationale de Football Association -FIFA- app and they ended up outside the stadium. “I didn’t want a refund, I didn’t want my money back,” she told Associated Press. “I wanted to go to the game.”
Resale and the risk of being left outside
The problem was repeated with other buyers. Jeroen Boersma travelled from Denver to Dallas and discovered that his StubHub tickets had been cancelled at the last minute, forcing him to buy again for more than double the original price, according to Business Insider. In the same investigation, a ticket broker from Florida summed up the failure of the secondary market by saying that “offering only a refund is malpractice”. The explanation points to so-called ghost tickets, resale listings that do not always guarantee that the seller actually has the ticket when it is advertised.
The result is a World Cup that widens the gap between football’s global promise and the real experience of those trying to live it in person. Tomonori Akutsu, a Japanese veteran of six consecutive World Cups, told Associated Press that, had he known how expensive this tournament would be, he might have reconsidered attending. His impression was even harsher: “This is America, ultimate capitalism.” His case shows that the issue does not only affect occasional fans or supporters from lower-income countries, but also those used to travelling for football and absorbing the costs of a World Cup.
The 2026 World Cup has pushed a growing trend to its limit: football as a tourist, premium event increasingly shaped by purchasing power. The World Cup remains a global celebration, but for many fans the first opponent is no longer on the pitch, but in the price.
Last related articles
