American football is one of the most popular sports in the US. Millions of people watch the games on the weekend, go to the stadium, or attend tailgates. Over the last years, the NFL has started to host international games in London, Mexico, and Germany. Although these games might annoy Americans due to the time zone challenges, they are a huge deal for people living in these countries. American football is growing outside of the US, and Germany is one of the biggest (if not the number one) market outside of the US. But how did American football become popular in Germany, how do Germans watch football, how will it turn out in the future, and how can people outside of the US watch the NFL better?
American football first came to Germany through American-occupying soldiers who played in the barracks during the war, enabling Germans to play America’s number one sport. Despite the soldiers playing tournaments and championships, the game didn’t really become popular until 1977, when the first team was founded by a group of American and German friends. Their success was limited, but started a huge trend. The next year, 5 more teams were founded, and in 1979 the first season took place. The premier game between the Frankfurt Lions and the Düsseldorf Panthers was watched by 4,4oo people in a small soccer stadium, with an end score of 38-0 in favor of the Lions, who ended up winning the German Bowl I against the Ansbach Grizzlies. Football was also growing in other European countries, leading to an international competition in 1981 in which Germany’s National Team beat Italy 12-6. Despite conflicts between the different organizations and associations that caused problems in the early 2000s, the first German player, Offensive Tackle Sebastian Vollmer, was drafted to the NFL in 2009 with the 58th pick by the New England Patriots and went on to win the Super Bowl with them in 2014.
The NFL started to host 4 international games in London a year, eventually leading to the first game in Germany in 2022. Over a million people tried to get tickets for the game between the Seahawks and the Buccaneers, desiring to watch legendary player Tom Brady. The game was a huge success, bringing together many people from Germany in and around the arena in Munich. This motivated the NFL to host two games in Frankfurt the next year, slating the Chiefs vs Dolphins and the Patriots vs Colts. One again, over a million people registered on the website to get tickets, causing people to see a screen telling them that 1,354,746 people were ahead of them waiting for a ticket. This year, the Giants and the Panthers play each other, which is very exciting as both teams have great fan bases in Germany due to their early overseas success.
TV channels in Germany began to show NFL playoff games in 2012, and in 2015 they started to show regular season games, expanding their program to show an early and a late Sunday game. Today, I would say that watching American football outside of the US is actually easier and probably cheaper than in the US. In every country besides the US and China, you can access the NFL Game Pass on DAZN, which enables users to watch every game, NFL Redzone, and extra film analysis material for around 150€ per full season. Although that might be a bit more pricey than NFL+ Premium, the NFL+ Premium subscription doesn’t enable viewers to watch a singular game on Sunday or the Thursday Night Game. For that, fans need a different subscription like NFL Sunday Ticket, which costs $479 and only gives the Sunday Games, or the full YouTube TV Package that costs $167.74/month for the season and then $72.99/month after the season in order to watch every game besides those hosted internationally or on Amazon Prime. Although Amazon streams their games for free on Twitch, it is still way more expensive than the Game Pass. If you care about being able to watch your favorite team on its own all the time without relying on regional TV games, you have to pay more in the country of American football than you do anywhere else.
The possibilities for watching American Football in Germany aren’t bad, building a good base for old and new fans to enjoy the sport at its highest level. The only thing that is limiting the interest in football in Germany is the time difference. The time that American football takes place makes it difficult for people to watch games, as even the early Sunday Games end around 10 pm and a primetime game begins at around 2 am. The time difference is something that, unfortunately, can’t change so it’s going to stay the biggest limiting factor for people’s interest in the NFL. With the international games becoming more and more prevalent and the European League of Football rising, American football is still growing in Europe, especially in Germany. More people watch the games or play themselves, whether they play Flag-Football variants or normal Football. The International Player Pathway Program is helping German players to get a chance to play in college or in the NFL, as the number of guys going to college in the US to play football is also increasing. The game will probably never beat soccer as Europe’s number one sport because the level of the ELF is not as high as the NFL the inability to establish a draft because there are no college teams. At the same time, more college players that don’t get into the NFL now play in the ELF, and bigger TV-channels overtake the rights for showing games in Germany to ensure that the sport is growing and entering primetime German TV, gaining even more attention. Though the future of American football in Germany and Europe is uncertain, it is for sure bright.
