The Sports in the Metaverse Report paints a picture on the sports landscape in the metaverse and highlights the generational change among sports fans, from older passive fans to younger active fans who seek out new ways to engage with their favorite sports. Thereby, it moves between both traditional players, such as established clubs, to the leading edge of innovation in the metaverse and blockchain. It dives into the different market verticals and provides a market size indication. For the report, we have collaborated with selected leaders from the Sports, Metaverse, and NFT space to dive into current market structures and dynamics.

The more time we have spent researching and exploring the sports metaverse space, the clearer our conclusion became: sport as an industry is at an inflection point in terms of commercialisation and fan engagement. The intersection with web3 and NFTs is set to benefit disproportionately from this trend and be the catalyst for future growth. We forecast the sports metaverse space may generate more than $80bn by 2030. Sport has entered the entertainment sector and is managed by sophisticated organisations and institutions. To unlock their full potential, they face the following challenges: A drastic and fast-paced evolution in consumption pattern; An increasingly demanding and harder-to-engage fan base; A technological landscape that is impossible to keep track with. By addressing these core issues, web3 founders and projects have made a name for themselves and created a vibrant landscape, which we have divided in several segments:

The metaverse itself is a huge opportunity for the world to add a new layer of human interaction to society. For sports specifically, it could create access points and virtual experiences for new audiences. This is not mutually exclusive with the joy of physical interaction of sports, but rather an extension that will allow for more inclusion across the industry. E-Sports is the best showcase for this: following the increased demand in purely digital competitions, especially among the younger generations, the sector has experienced enormous growth. And while the sport is happening entirely online, fans still enjoy gathering in real-world stadiums and see their favourite teams play on the ground. More generally, sport consumption has dramatically evolved over the last decades and turned a fairly static industry into a rocket ship of technological innovation. Today, certain teams and athletes have more presence in people’s daily lives than leading politicians. While the best ways to engage with communities are ever-evolving, the sport community has proven to be a fast adopter, increasingly integrating new elements such as NFTs and web3 apps. Fan engagement is the holy grail in sports. How to engage fans in the future and how to use the latest technological advancements to take the interactions to the next level remain the key questions. Especially as attention spans and the hesitance to pay for sports content are decreasing among younger generations. We are currently experiencing a phase of phenomenal experiments, from the participation of fans in live events to decentralised ownership of entire clubs, and it will be exciting to see which one of these changes the world of sport forever.