WNBA Receives $2.2 Billion in New TV Rights

The league’s current media rights were set to expire after the 2025 season, and the NBA, which owns about 60 percent of the WNBA, has been negotiating the new deals, which are not yet official. The WNBA’s current media rights were valued at about $60 million per year, and the new structure would be around $200 million annually. WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert said this spring that she hoped to at least double the league’s annual rights revenue as interest grows, and these terms would more than triple it.

“‘If you build it, they will come’ has really come to light now that everybody’s talking about the WNBA,” Engelbert said at the time. “One thing we wanted was active free agency, and we got that, right? Last year, huge free agent movements, and it creates excitement and it creates household names. It creates rivalries. It creates super teams. And that’s what you want in a league, because that’s what keeps people watching, that’s what determines the value of whether it’s your media rights, your business partnerships, your valuation of your franchises.”

The increase in revenue will significantly impact the league’s finances at a time when interest in the league and women’s sports in general continues to grow. WNBA players are expected to opt out of the collective bargaining agreement after this year, which would end that deal after the 2025 season and allow the league and its players to negotiate a new agreement that outlines everything from salary caps to benefits and other financial details. Nearly every player in the league who isn’t on a rookie contract will sign a short-term contract in anticipation of a new, increased salary structure. The league will also add two expansion teams over the next two years.

The NBA’s media rights deals are reportedly worth about $76 billion over 11 years, and some have criticized the arrangement that would have the WNBA negotiate its rights alongside the NBA. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver and Engelbert have pushed back against that idea.

“It’s a huge advantage for us to go to market with the NBA,” Engelbert said this spring. “Especially with streaming services that rely on a 12-month subscription model. If we’re only there for 4½ months … how attractive is that? But we and the NBA are perhaps the only sports companies that can offer 330 days of live programming — almost the entire year. That’s tremendous value for a subscription platform.”

Terri Jackson, executive director of the Women’s National Basketball Players Association, still had questions about the reported structure of the deal.

“We’ve been wondering for months how the NBA would value the WNBA in its media rights deal,” Jackson said in a statement Wednesday. “With a reported $75 billion deal on the table, the league controls its own destiny. More precisely, the NBA controls the destiny of the WNBA. We look forward to hearing how the NBA arrived at a $200 million (annual) valuation — if initial reports are accurate or even close. Neither the NBA nor the WNBA can deny that we’ve seen unprecedented growth across all metrics in recent years, the players continue to demonstrate their dedication to building the brand, and the fans continue to show up. There is no excuse to undervalue the WNBA again.”