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Bundesliga launches its own streaming platform: Fan Revolution 2026!
The Austrian Bundesliga is planning its own streaming platform for games from 2026. Self-marketing should bring long-term benefits.
Bundesliga launches its own streaming platform: Fan Revolution 2026!
The Austrian Bundesliga is planning a radical change in its media marketing. From summer 2026, it wants to market its media rights independently and set up its own streaming platform for broadcasting its games. This decision was made at a club conference of the 12 Bundesliga clubs, reported 5min. The aim of the project is to reach fans directly, without involving external rights holders.
Christian Ebenbauer, board member of the Bundesliga, said that the current offers do not sufficiently reflect the positive development of the league. The introduction of a “direct to consumer” model could therefore represent a promising alternative. This project has been in preparation for about a year and a half, and an economic analysis shows that self-marketing could be beneficial in the long term.
DFL media rights allocation
The award applies to both the Bundesliga and the 2nd Bundesliga, the Supercup and relegation games. The tender covers German-speaking areas, including Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The DFL also expects a collective income of 1.1 billion euros per season from media rights, which is crucial for many clubs, especially the smaller ones.
Innovations and challenges
The DFL plans to carry out the tender without the previously applicable “no single buyer” rule. This could make it possible that a single provider cannot acquire all the rights, which was previously stipulated by the Federal Cartel Office. This is considered important to promote diversity in reporting and increase competition among media partners.
As part of the allocation of media rights, the DFL remained transparent and wanted to continue to offer the clubs security. The live rights will be taken over by Sky and DAZN, among others, while the public broadcasters ARD and ZDF will continue to retain the highlight rights. Discussions about further options, including the classic rights allocation model, are running parallel to the new developments in the Austrian Bundesliga.
The Bundesliga's plans could potentially follow the example of the Dutch Eredivisie, which founded its own media company in 2008. Although high initial investments for technology and personnel will be necessary, neither financial participation from the clubs nor a clear financing pattern by the end of 2025 is known.
Overall, it remains to be seen how developments in the area of media rights will affect the two leagues and what new opportunities will arise for fans. The Bundesliga has set itself ambitious goals that could potentially change football's entire media environment. Further information will be provided to fans by the end of 2025 so that they can have access to the games from summer 2026, as reported by bundesliga.com reported.