The European football landscape is on the verge of a seismic shift as UEFA and its newly rebranded partner, European Football Clubs, gear up to auction off the next cycle of Champions League broadcasting rights. With the tender process officially kicking off on October 13, 2025, in Europe’s five powerhouse markets—France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the United Kingdom—the sport’s governing bodies are setting their sights higher than ever before. Their target? To smash through the €5 billion (£4.3bn, $5.7bn) annual media income barrier and fundamentally reshape how fans across the globe experience the world’s premier club competitions.
This ambitious endeavor is being orchestrated by UC3, the joint venture between UEFA and European Football Clubs (formerly the European Club Association), and marks the first time American agency Relevent will oversee the process after supplanting TEAM Marketing in 2024. TEAM’s 34-year tenure with UEFA may have been historic, but the winds of change are blowing with the promise of innovation and, potentially, unprecedented revenue.
So, what’s the game plan? Relevent and UC3 are rolling out the red carpet for global streaming heavyweights like Netflix, Apple, Amazon, Disney, DAZN, and even YouTube. The idea is to entice at least one of these digital titans to secure exclusive global rights for at least one Champions League fixture per season, or perhaps even per matchweek. This approach takes a page straight from Netflix’s own playbook, following its headline-grabbing $150 million deal to stream two NFL games on Christmas Day—each drawing in over 24 million viewers in the U.S. alone. According to reports, Netflix has also locked down exclusive U.S. rights for the 2027 and 2031 editions of the Women’s World Cup, signaling a clear appetite for top-tier sports content.
Relevent’s strategy isn’t just about luring newcomers; current media partners are also being invited to the table, with the tantalizing prospect of multi-market, long-term deals. This marks a sharp departure from the European Commission’s longstanding insistence on shorter, three-year contracts designed to foster competition—a system that many broadcasters have found both risky and costly. The new approach could see deals spanning longer periods, offering both stability for broadcasters and a significant cash injection for European football.
DAZN and Amazon are seen as particularly viable contenders. DAZN has already made waves by acquiring global streaming rights for two editions of the Club World Cup, while Amazon currently streams a Champions League game every week in Germany, Italy, and the UK. Disney, too, has thrown its hat into the ring, having secured the global rights to the Women’s Champions League through the 2029-30 season. Apple, for its part, has a 10-year global deal with Major League Soccer and recently inked a seven-year contract for MLB games. Even YouTube is getting in on the action, having exclusively streamed an NFL Week 1 game this season.
As the tender process unfolds, the stakes are sky-high. The current UEFA TV rights deal, which covers the 2024-2027 cycle, is worth £2.9 billion ($3.9bn), with Champions League clubs receiving the lion’s share—about 75 percent. Europa League sides take home 17 percent, while Conference League teams claim the remaining 8 percent. But with the new cycle, UC3 is aiming for a quantum leap in value, leveraging the global reach and deep pockets of streaming giants to drive up bids.
UEFA President Alexander Ceferin made the organization’s ambitions crystal clear at a recent press conference. “Together we are building something unique with ambition, to deliver the most engaging football, the most innovative and the most accessible, to expand our core revenue streams,” he stated. “To inspire new fans to follow our competitions, to drive engagement with new audiences, especially in an ever-changing media and streaming rights landscape, and to make the most of digital platforms and bring the game closer together forever. This is how we will keep European football at the very top.”
Guy-Laurent Epstein, UC3’s co-managing director, echoed this sentiment, highlighting the group’s forward-thinking approach: “This new strategy reflects our ambition to lead the next phase of growth for UEFA men’s club competitions. By bringing a fresh approach to key markets and introducing innovative new packages, we are setting a new benchmark for how football is brought to fans around the world.”
Currently, the Champions League is broadcast by a patchwork of networks: TNT Sports in the UK, Sky Sports and DAZN in Italy and Germany, Movistar Plus+ in Spain, and Canal+ and M6 in France. Amazon, as noted, streams one game per week in each of its European strongholds. But with the new tender, the possibility looms that a single streaming platform could bring Champions League action to a truly global audience in real time—an enticing prospect for both fans and rights holders alike.
Of course, the move toward streaming is not without its challenges. Questions remain about whether any exclusive global deal would cover just the league phase or extend into the high-stakes knockout rounds. And while Netflix, Apple, and Amazon are household names, the competitive landscape is fierce, with DAZN, Disney, and YouTube all eager to carve out their own slice of the lucrative football pie.
Relevent’s growing influence in European football cannot be overstated. The agency brokered a $1.5 billion, six-year deal for Champions League rights in the U.S. with Paramount back in 2022 and played a key role in LaLiga’s historic decision to stage a match between Barcelona and Villarreal in Miami this December—the first such event for any European league. While FIFA has historically blocked such overseas fixtures, regulatory loopholes and ongoing reviews have forced UEFA’s hand, leading to a reluctant approval for both LaLiga and Serie A to stage matches abroad this season.
As the digital revolution gathers pace, UEFA’s pivot toward streaming giants is more than just a response to changing viewer habits—it’s a bold bet on the future of football. The hope is that by harnessing the reach, innovation, and financial muscle of platforms like Netflix, Amazon, and Disney, European club competitions can remain at the pinnacle of global sport, captivating new generations of fans in the process.
With the tender process about to begin and interest from both established broadcasters and digital disruptors, all eyes are on UEFA, UC3, and Relevent. Will a streaming giant land the ultimate prize? Or will traditional networks hold their ground in the face of unprecedented competition? The only certainty is that the next chapter in European football’s media saga promises to be as dramatic and unpredictable as the sport itself.
As the bidding war heats up and negotiations intensify, fans, clubs, and broadcasters alike are bracing for a new era—one where the beautiful game could be just a click away, wherever you are in the world.
