The scale of American football can be measured in sharply different ways: participation in school-based sport, the audience for a single televised game, and money shared across a professional league. The available figures do not describe one common measure or establish a link between them. Taken separately, however, they show a large high-school player base whose boys’ 11-player participation has risen in three of the past four years, a record audience for the 2024 NFL Kickoff Game, and NFL national-revenue figures above $13 billion in 2023 and above $14 billion for the 2025 season. [Source 240001] [Source 240002] [Source 240003] [Source 240004]
A record for the opening game
The 2024 NFL Kickoff Game between the Baltimore Ravens and Kansas City Chiefs averaged 28.9 million viewers across NBC and Peacock, according to NBC Sports. NBC Sports described it as the most-watched NFL Kickoff Game ever. [Source 240002]
That record is specific to the NFL’s kickoff-game category. It concerns the average audience reported for that Ravens-Chiefs broadcast across NBC and Peacock, rather than an estimate of interest across an entire season or all forms of football. [Source 240002]
The figure nonetheless provides a defined benchmark for a prominent professional-season broadcast: 28.9 million viewers for one game, with the broadcaster identifying it as the largest audience in the history of that opening-game slot. [Source 240002]
Participation trend in boys’ 11-player football
At the high-school level, the National Federation of State High School Associations reports that participation in boys’ 11-player football has increased in three of the past four years. [Source 240001]
The statement is limited to boys’ 11-player football and to the pattern over those four years. It is a participation trend, not a measure of television consumption or professional-league income. [Source 240001]
That distinction matters when figures from separate parts of the sport are placed alongside one another. The NFHS measure concerns school participation, while the NFL audience measure concerns a particular nationally distributed broadcast.
Neither figure, on its own, indicates the other. [Source 240001] [Source 240002]
Still, the recent high-school pattern is clear in the NFHS material: boys’ 11-player participation has moved higher in three of the past four years. [Source 240001]
NFL national revenue in 2023
For the 2023 season, NFL national revenue reached $13 billion, according to Sportico. The same report said each of the league’s 32 teams received just over $400 million from the league office. [Source 240003]
The figures concern national revenue and the per-team amount distributed from the league office. They offer a league-level financial measure that differs from individual game viewership and from high-school participation. [Source 240003]
The $13 billion figure and the just-over-$400-million distribution put the NFL’s shared national business at a scale that can be stated directly from the reported data. [Source 240003]
More than $14 billion for the 2025 season
Sportico later reported that NFL national revenue for the 2025 season topped $14 billion. It said each of the 32 teams had gross revenue of more than $450 million from national sources. [Source 240004]
The report describes those national sources as media rights, league sponsorships and other league-wide deals. [Source 240004]
Placed next to the 2023 figures, the reports show a change in the stated national-revenue total from $13 billion to more than $14 billion. The corresponding per-team figures moved from just over $400 million to more than $450 million. [Source 240003] [Source 240004]
The comparison is confined to the figures reported for those seasons.
It does not turn the individual data points into a broader account of all football-related income, nor does it address the financial position of high-school programs. [Source 240003] [Source 240004]
Separate measures, one view of scale
The available record therefore contains three distinct observations. The 2024 Ravens-Chiefs kickoff broadcast averaged 28.9 million viewers and was described by NBC Sports as the most-watched NFL Kickoff Game ever. [Source 240002]
The NFHS reports an increase in boys’ 11-player high-school football participation in three of the past four years. [Source 240001]
And Sportico’s NFL financial reports place national revenue at $13 billion for the 2023 season and above $14 billion for the 2025 season, with per-team national amounts reported at just over $400 million and more than $450 million, respectively. [Source 240003] [Source 240004]
Those measures should be read on their own terms.
One captures a single broadcast audience, one describes a recent participation pattern in boys’ 11-player high-school football, and two describe national NFL revenue and distributions. Together, they provide a narrowly defined picture of football’s reach across school participation, a major television event and the NFL’s shared national business. [Source 240001] [Source 240002] [Source 240003] [Source 240004]