The 'Gen-Z' continue to change how football is consumed

Football has always been a 90-minute show, but millions of young people born between 1995 and 2010, known as Generation Z, no longer enjoy that format. According to a report by Deloitte Sports Business, 42% of fans between 18 and 24 years old prefer to consume “highlights” through social networks or streaming sports documentaries instead of watching a full game.

Platforms like TikTok are leading this revolution. With videos lasting less than a minute, highlights go viral in seconds and cross borders. A Kylian Mbappé goal can accumulate millions of views in a matter of hours, reaching audiences that would never sit in front of a television for two hours.

BOOOOOOOOOOOM 💣#laligahighlights pic.twitter.com/3M5kUVnw3y

Todayss football competes with Netflix, Fortnite and thousands of content creators, and the clubs know it. FC Barcelona, for example, produces exclusive content for TikTok and already has more than 60 million followers on that platform. Other teams use Twitch for live broadcasts with players and coaches, seeking to generate closeness with the young audience. Even the MLS, boosted by the arrival of Lionel Messi, has invested heavily in shorts and reels to capture the interest of teenagers.

Generation Z not only attends the game: it documents the experience, creates content in real time and shares it on networks. Football becomes raw material for thousands of “Instagram Reels”. Young people make the party more than just an isolated event.

But it's not all advantages. The fragmentation of consumption can weaken the collective experience that made football great. Furthermore, content saturation creates the risk of trivializing emotion and reducing it to ephemeral virals.

The leagues, for their part, face a dilemma: how to monetize this new form of consumption. Television contracts, historically their largest source of income, are threatened if audiences move to free social networks. To combat it, leagues and federations are now seeking alliances with streaming platforms such as Amazon Prime Video and HBO Max.

In short, the future of the fans lies in a hybrid terrain: maintaining the passion of the stadium, but translated to the rhythm of the networks. The challenge for clubs and leagues is clear: if they fail to speak the digital language of young people, they risk losing an entire generation of fans.