Author: Zen, PANews
The long-awaited 2026 FIFA World Cup will officially kick off in Mexico City at 3:00 AM Beijing Time on June 12.
Dubbed an unprecedented super event, this World Cup will feature 48 teams playing a total of 104 matches across venues in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Barring any unforeseen circumstances, this is poised to become the World Cup with the highest commercial revenue in history.
However, on the eve of the opening ceremony, this tournament is facing a dilemma of unsold tickets. According to the Financial Times, with the opening match just around the corner, there are still approximately 180,000 group stage tickets available for resale. For a top-tier event long regarded as a global spectacle, this contrast is strikingly stark.
This is not because the World Cup itself has lost its global appeal. In fact, the betting industry is touting this World Cup as the "biggest betting opportunity" in history. As of June 11, the amount staked on the event contract for the World Cup winner on the prediction market Polymarket has approached $20 billion. Such a massive influx of capital before the tournament even begins clearly indicates its immense popularity.
Therefore, the issue of "difficult ticket sales" lies more with FIFA's ticketing mechanisms, also exposing the side effects of FIFA's radical commercialization experiment with the ticketing system for this World Cup.
FIFA's Ticketing "Shenanigans": Buy a "Digital Collectible" First for a Ticket
One of the most controversial ticketing arrangements for this World Cup is FIFA's sale of so-called "Right-To-Buy" (RTB) through the FIFA Collect platform.
Unlike traditional ticketing products, RTB is a type of "digital right" or "digital collectible" designed around the eligibility to obtain World Cup tickets, issued and traded via the FIFA Collect digital collectibles platform. The issued digital collectibles are essentially NFTs. The FIFA Collect platform originally ran on the Algorand blockchain and migrated to FIFA's self-built FIFA Blockchain (based on Avalanche technology) in May 2025.
According to the official explanation from FIFA Collect, holding an RTB only grants fans the opportunity to purchase tickets for a specific match during a designated window. Each RTB specifies how many tickets the holder can purchase in the future, and for which match or event, but it does not include the actual ticket itself.
This mechanism splits the ticket-buying process into two steps: first, selling scarcity, and then selling the actual ticket. However, when fans purchase an RTB, they often do not know the final seating area, the full ticket price, and cannot fully assess the future value of this "priority right."
In terms of pricing, RTBs do not have a fixed price; they vary based on the importance of the corresponding match, the number of tickets that can be purchased, and market supply and demand. Previously on the FIFA Collect platform, prices for RTBs for different matches ranged from tens to hundreds of dollars, with some RTBs for popular matches or those including multiple ticket purchase rights fetching even higher prices on the secondary market.
According to reports from the UK sports business media SportsPro, FIFA had already generated revenue in the tens of millions of dollars from these RTB sales.
When tickets are highly scarce and prices are not fully known, such a design encouraging fans to pay upfront might make some sense. However, the awkwardness of RTBs becomes apparent when a significant number of tickets remain available for sale on the official platform. If tickets aren't as hard to get as imagined, the rationale for spending hundreds of dollars upfront for a "ticket purchase qualification" is called into question.
Not Just Expensive, But Also Opaque and Constantly Changing Prices
This tournament's main matches are concentrated in the US market, which is already the world's most mature and expensive market for live sports entertainment. Events like the NFL, NBA, and MLB have long employed business models featuring high ticket prices, luxury boxes, dynamic pricing, and secondary markets. Naturally, upon entering this market, FIFA aimed to align World Cup pricing with these standards.
FIFA has adopted a dynamic or variable pricing model for this World Cup, meaning ticket prices can be continuously adjusted based on demand, inventory, and sales phases. Early on, officials emphasized that some group stage tickets started at $60, but this low-price tier was limited. More prevalent were ticket prices far exceeding fan expectations; for instance, tickets for some popular group stage matches easily cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars, while prices for knockout stages and the final were exorbitantly high.
Reportedly, the actual ticket cost for this World Cup is about 2 to 4 times that of the previous Qatar World Cup, with popular matches, the opening match, and the final reaching 4 to 7 times higher. The problem lies in the fact that the World Cup is not an ordinary commercial league. Its audience isn't just local high-income sports consumers, but ordinary fans from all over the world. Many, in order to support their national teams, need to travel across continents, book flights and hotels in advance, and incur other costs like local transportation. For these fans, ticket prices are only a part of the total cost, but they have become the most uncontrollable part.
What further frustrates fans is the lack of transparency. Complaints from European fan organizations and consumer groups to FIFA stated that FIFA did not adequately disclose from the outset how many tickets remained in each price tier or specific seat locations. Some fans even had to pay high fees without being able to fully confirm seat views and locations during purchase. This information asymmetry severely amplifies the feeling of being "manipulated."
Currently, FIFA's ticketing mechanisms have not only sparked commercial controversy but have also attracted public regulatory scrutiny. Relevant departments in the US states of New York and New Jersey have also launched investigations into the World Cup ticketing, focusing on seat information, ticketing promotions, and potential issues of so-called "artificial scarcity."
Official Resale Platform Amplifies Price Anxiety
FIFA specifically launched an official resale platform for this World Cup. In theory, this was to allow fans to buy and sell tickets in a secure environment, reducing fraud and black-market transactions. However, while this platform improved transaction security, it did not enhance the ticket-buying experience for fans.
The European Fans' Association and the European Consumer Organization criticized FIFA for charging fees to both buyers and sellers on the official resale platform, allowing FIFA to continue profiting from subsequent transactions after the initial ticket sale. According to ticketing rules cited by the Financial Times, on FIFA's official resale platform, sellers pay a service fee of approximately 10% when listing a ticket, while buyers must pay an additional fee of about 17% in commissions and related surcharges.
This means that if a ticket is resold through the official platform, the combined fees borne by both parties amount to nearly 27% of the ticket's face value. This allows FIFA to not only enjoy high ticket revenue in the primary market but also continue capturing fees from the secondary resale market.
And as of now, the FIFA official site is still selling tens of thousands of group stage tickets. For scalpers and speculators who hoped to profit from reselling at higher prices after hoarding tickets at high prices, even listing at the original price would result in an actual loss after deducting platform fees.
Of course, the 180,000 tickets available for resale won't actually lead to a large number of empty seats at this World Cup. FIFA President Gianni Infantino stated at a pre-opening press conference that the tournament has sold over 6 million tickets and claimed that demand exceeded expectations by "10 times or more." Popular matches, host nation matches, knockout stages, and the final will still attract enormous attention. As the tournament begins, emotions rise, and teams' progression becomes clearer, some of the inventory may also be absorbed.
But the significance of this controversy lies in its reminder that even if overall World Cup sales remain strong, this tournament has proven that fans' passion does not equate to an unlimited willingness to pay; there is still a boundary for ticket prices and ticketing mechanisms that should not be easily crossed. The World Cup's global influence does not mean FIFA can endlessly squeeze this emotional premium.
