Women’s elite sports are no longer simply being discussed as an emerging commercial opportunity.
The money is arriving.
Deloitte Global projects women’s elite sports will generate at least $3 billion in revenue in 2026, up from $2.4 billion in 2025 and representing projected growth of 340% since 2022.
For women’s rugby — and particularly the game in the United States — the timing could hardly be more important.
The U.S. now has Women’s Elite Rugby (WER), its first professional women’s rugby league, a growing collegiate player pipeline, increasing access to elite international rugby and two enormous events on the horizon: rugby sevens at the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games and a Women’s Rugby World Cup on American soil in 2033.
The larger question is whether rugby can turn those pieces into a sustainable commercial ecosystem.
Women’s Sports Cross the $3 Billion Mark
Deloitte’s 2026 forecast provides a striking picture of how quickly the economics surrounding elite women’s sports are changing.
The firm projects at least $3 billion in global revenue, including:
- $1.4 billion from commercial revenue, including sponsorship, partnerships and merchandising
- $911 million from matchday revenue
- $765 million from broadcast revenue
Commercial revenue alone is expected to account for approximately 45% of the total.
North America is projected to remain the largest market, accounting for approximately 54% of worldwide women’s elite sports revenue.
Soccer and basketball remain well ahead of the rest of the field, with each expected to account for approximately 35% of global revenue.
But the significance for rugby isn’t that rugby is about to catch either sport.
It is that the commercial market surrounding women’s sports is becoming much larger at precisely the moment women’s rugby is building new properties, audiences and pathways.
Source: Deloitte Global, Game Changers: Unlocking the Potential of Women’s Sports, April 2026.
The Rugby World Cup Showed What Is Possible
Women’s Rugby World Cup 2025 demonstrated what sustained investment and a major global event can do for the visibility of women’s rugby.
Deloitte highlighted the tournament as part of the wider acceleration of women’s sports and the growing ability of major events to bring new audiences into women’s competitions.
That matters beyond a World Cup.
Major events can introduce people to rugby.
The commercial challenge is turning those occasional viewers into supporters who follow domestic leagues, national teams and players after the tournament ends.
That question is particularly important in the United States.
America Now Has a Professional Women’s Rugby League
Women’s Elite Rugby has completed its second season, giving American women’s rugby something it previously lacked: a professional domestic competition at the top of the club pathway.
WER officially launched in 2024 and began competition in 2025 with six founding markets.
In 2026, the league consisted of:
- Bay Breakers
- Boston Banshees
- Chicago Tempest
- Denver Onyx
- New York Exiles
- TC Gemini
The Denver Onyx defeated the Bay Breakers 24–17 in the 2026 Legacy Cup, becoming WER’s first back-to-back champion after also winning the inaugural title in 2025.
WER says its six teams feature approximately 180 elite players.
The league’s existence alone represents a major structural change.
Before WER, the Women’s Premier League provided the highest level of domestic women’s club competition, but it operated through an amateur, player-driven model.
WER is attempting to turn that competitive foundation into a sustainable professional sports property.
Source: Women’s Elite Rugby, official league information and 2026 Legacy Cup report.
From Paying to Play to Being Paid to Play
Perhaps the clearest way to understand the significance of WER is to look at what came before it.
Boston.com reported ahead of WER’s inaugural season that players conservatively estimated they had spent approximately $5,000 per WPL season on costs including travel, insurance, gym memberships and other fees.
Think about what that meant.
Some of the best women’s rugby players in the United States were spending thousands of dollars of their own money simply to compete at the highest level available domestically.
WER changed that equation.
The league confirmed that it would cover player travel costs and provide accident insurance while also compensating players.
The exact amount of player compensation has not been publicly disclosed.
Most players continued to maintain jobs outside rugby during the league’s early stages, according to reporting around WER’s launch.
That means “professional” does not yet necessarily mean that rugby can be an athlete’s only source of income.
But the change is still substantial.
American elite women’s club rugby has begun moving through three very different economic stages:
Pay to play → paid to play → eventually, paid enough to play full time.
The first transition has happened.
The second could become one of the defining challenges of WER’s next several seasons.
Source: Boston.com / The Boston Globe, By putting its players’ needs first, Women’s Elite Rugby wants to be the next big thing in pro sports, March 21, 2025.
Why Full-Time Compensation Matters
This is about more than athletes’ paychecks.
Players who can devote more of their working lives to rugby have more time available for training, recovery, strength and conditioning, tactical preparation and other elements of elite performance.
WER president and co-founder Jessica Hammond-Graf has spoken about creating an American environment that allows elite players to develop without having to leave the country for better-supported opportunities overseas.
That creates a direct connection between the commercial success of WER and the development of the American player pool.
More revenue can support better professional conditions.
Better professional conditions can help attract and retain stronger players.
A stronger competition can attract larger audiences.
Larger audiences become more valuable to sponsors and media partners.
That produces more revenue.
It is the commercial cycle every developing professional league wants to establish.
The Women’s Eagles Have Taken a Major Step Too
WER is not the only part of American women’s rugby where compensation has changed.
Ahead of the 2025 Women’s Rugby World Cup, 38 Women’s Eagles received USA Rugby contracts covering the six-month period from April through September.
RugbyPass reported that USA Rugby established three tiers of contracts, with the program accounting for approximately 25% of the women’s 15s budget for 2025.
That was a landmark change.
Previously, Women’s Eagles players had generally been paid while attending national-team camps rather than receiving sustained contracts covering the months between them.
Captain Kate Zackary explained that the new arrangement provided players with financial stability leading into the World Cup and reduced the need to balance elite international preparation with outside employment.
For domestic players also competing in WER, it created the beginnings of something American women’s rugby has rarely possessed:
multiple opportunities to earn money from playing the sport.
That could eventually produce a much clearer professional pathway:
College Rugby → Women’s Elite Rugby → Women’s Eagles
RFC’s How Does College Rugby Work in the United States? guide explains how NIRA, CRAA, NCR and USA Rugby fit into the broader American college and national-team landscape.
And as commercial opportunities around athletes grow, there is potentially another layer beyond that through sponsorships, appearances and personal brands.
Source: RugbyPass, Landmark first USA Rugby contracts awarded ahead of RWC 2025, May 20, 2025.
College Rugby Could Be America’s Hidden Advantage
Professional rugby is only one part of the American women’s rugby ecosystem.
Below it sits an increasingly important collegiate pathway.
The NCAA reported that 939 women competed in NCAA rugby during the 2024–25 academic year.
That represented an 11% increase in one year and a 250% increase over ten years.
Rugby remains part of the NCAA Emerging Sports for Women program, leaving room for additional institutional growth.
RFC explains what that status means — and how a sport can progress toward possible NCAA championship status — in its What Is the NCAA Emerging Sports for Women Program? guide.
NCAA varsity rugby also represents only one part of American collegiate women’s rugby.
The wider USA College Rugby landscape includes several different competition systems, including NIRA, CRAA and NCR.
NIRA is particularly important to the varsity pathway. RFC’s NIRA Women’s NCAA Varsity Rugby hub tracks schedules, results, standings and championship information for programs competing in that environment.
CRAA and NCR provide additional women’s collegiate competition outside that NIRA varsity structure.
That gives American rugby an existing network of universities, clubs, coaches, players, alumni and communities that can potentially feed the professional and international levels.
For WER, that could become an important advantage.
Professional leagues need players.
But they also need stories, rivalries and audiences.
A supporter who follows a player through college has a reason to continue following that athlete when she moves into professional rugby or the national-team pathway.
Building those connections could help turn college rugby into something more than a player-development system.
It could become part of WER’s fan-development system too.
Source: NCAA, Women’s sports reach record NCAA participation as leadership roles keep rising, March 2026.
WER Has Expanded Its Television Reach
Getting the product in front of those fans matters.
WER signed an exclusive 2026 media partnership with the Women’s Sports Network, with all matches broadcast through the free, ad-supported network.
WER says WSN is available through platforms including Roku, Samsung TV Plus, Tubi, Amazon Prime Video, Pluto TV, LG Channels, Fubo, Plex and others.
That is particularly useful for an emerging league because discovering WER does not necessarily require purchasing another sports subscription.
Women’s rugby does not only need existing rugby supporters.
It needs people who were not planning to watch rugby at all.
Putting matches onto widely available free platforms reduces the friction between discovering the sport and actually watching it.
Source: Women’s Elite Rugby, Women’s Elite Rugby Announces Exclusive 2026 Broadcast Partnership With The Women’s Sports Network, February 18, 2026.
The Venue Question Is More Complicated Than “Get a Bigger Stadium”
Deloitte projects $911 million in matchday revenue across women’s elite sports in 2026.
That represents approximately 30% of the entire market and an increase from $748 million in 2025.
For WER, that makes the economics of attending matches extremely important.
And the league itself acknowledges that finding the right venues has been difficult.
Ahead of WER’s second season, Hammond-Graf told The Guardian that securing venues had been one of the hardest parts of building the league.
But she also made an important distinction.
WER does not simply need enormous stadiums.
It needs the right stadiums.
A 20,000-seat venue can make little sense if only a fraction of the seats are occupied.
At the same time, WER wants to move beyond the parks-and-recreation-field environment associated with the amateur game and put elite players into facilities that look and feel professional.
That led to venue changes in 2026, including the Bay Breakers moving to Heart Health Park in Sacramento and Chicago using Benedictine University.
This makes venue strategy one of WER’s most interesting business challenges.
The question isn’t:
How quickly can WER move into huge stadiums?
It is:
What venue gives each market the best combination of atmosphere, capacity, player facilities and economics?
Source: The Guardian, Women’s Elite Rugby enters season two with lessons learned, a pop star investor and ambition for US game, May 2, 2026.
Matchday Revenue Is About More Than Tickets
The venue question connects to something even larger.
Selling a ticket is only one part of matchday economics.
There is also:
- food and beverage
- merchandise
- premium seating and hospitality
- sponsorship activation
- youth clinics
- supporter events
- player appearances
- repeat attendance
WER has already experimented with some of those surrounding activities, including youth clinics and player meet-and-greets around major events.
For a developing league, the objective should not simply be to announce a large attendance number.
It is to increase the value of each person walking through the gates while creating an experience compelling enough that they return.
That is why control over venue economics may eventually become just as important as venue size.
The goal isn’t necessarily stadium ownership.
It is better matchday economics.
Better Economics Can Create Better Player Conditions
This brings the business argument back to the athletes.
Greater ticket revenue, sponsorship, broadcasting income and merchandise sales give a league more resources.
Those resources can support player compensation, coaching, medical care, strength and conditioning, travel and training environments.
Better professional conditions can help retain elite players.
Better players can improve the competition.
A stronger competition can attract larger audiences.
And those audiences can make WER more valuable to commercial partners.
That cycle is far from guaranteed.
But it is how women’s rugby can begin capturing part of the much larger women’s sports economy Deloitte is describing.
The Women’s Eagles Are Part of a Bigger U.S. Growth Strategy
World Rugby is explicitly treating the United States as a major growth market ahead of the 2031 Men’s Rugby World Cup and the 2033 Women’s Rugby World Cup.
Women’s rugby is central to that strategy.
The 2026 Pacific Four Series brought elite women’s international rugby to American venues, while the Women’s Eagles continue to provide the top of the domestic player pathway.
That international level matters commercially as well as competitively.
National-team matches can introduce audiences to athletes who also compete for professional and collegiate programs.
The stronger the connections between those levels become, the easier it becomes for a fan to move through the rugby ecosystem rather than disappearing after one major event.
Source: World Rugby, U.S. growth strategy and Rugby World Cup 2031/2033 planning.
LA28 Is the First Big Test
The next enormous opportunity comes much sooner than 2033.
Rugby sevens will be part of the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games.
The U.S. women’s sevens team’s bronze-medal run at Paris 2024 demonstrated the power of Olympic exposure.
It introduced millions of Americans to the sport and helped elevate players such as Ilona Maher far beyond rugby’s traditional audience.
LA28 brings that opportunity onto American soil.
This time, however, the domestic rugby infrastructure should be better prepared to capitalize.
By then WER could be entering its fourth season.
College rugby should have another two years of development.
And USA Rugby will be only three years away from hosting the men’s Rugby World Cup before the women’s tournament arrives in 2033.
The question after LA28 therefore should not be:
Did Americans enjoy watching Olympic rugby?
It should be:
Where can those Americans watch rugby next weekend?
2033 Is the Bigger Deadline
Five years after LA28, the United States will host the Women’s Rugby World Cup in 2033.
That gives American rugby an unusual runway.
There is time to build.
Professional teams.
College programs.
Youth participation.
Coaches.
Better venues.
Media coverage.
Sponsors.
And, most importantly, supporters.
The most valuable outcome of the 2033 World Cup would not simply be a huge crowd for the final.
It would be thousands of new rugby supporters who still know what to watch, where to go and whom to support after the World Cup leaves town.
That is where WER, college rugby and the Women’s Eagles become critical.
They provide somewhere for those fans to go.
Rugby Doesn’t Need to Become Basketball
There is an important reality underneath all of this.
Deloitte expects basketball and soccer to each generate approximately 35% of women’s elite sports revenue in 2026.
Together, they account for roughly 70% of the projected market.
Rugby isn’t competing on that scale.
Nor does it need to.
The opportunity isn’t for women’s rugby to suddenly become the WNBA or women’s soccer.
It is for rugby to capture a larger share of a rapidly expanding market.
A $3 billion women’s sports economy creates opportunities for sports properties capable of demonstrating engaged audiences, compelling athletes, valuable live events and attractive communities for commercial partners.
Rugby possesses those ingredients.
What it has historically lacked — particularly in the United States — is the infrastructure connecting them.
That is beginning to change.
By the Numbers
The key figures behind the growth opportunity for women’s rugby in the United States.
A Rare Window for Women’s Rugby in America
There may never have been a better alignment of circumstances for women’s rugby in the United States.
A professional domestic league now exists.
Players who once paid thousands of dollars to compete at the highest domestic level are now entering an environment where key expenses are covered and compensation is available.
The Women’s Eagles have taken a major step toward professionalization through national-team contracts.
College participation is growing.
Professional matches are becoming easier to watch.
The Olympics arrive in Los Angeles in 2028.
And the biggest tournament in women’s rugby comes to the United States in 2033.
All of that is happening while the global women’s elite sports economy crosses $3 billion for the first time.
But none of that guarantees success.
WER still has to build sustainable revenue.
American rugby still has to develop more players.
Venues have to work economically.
Fans have to come back after the Olympics and World Cup.
Sponsors have to see sufficient value to keep investing.
And player compensation ultimately has to progress beyond the early stages of professionalization if the United States wants more of its best athletes to make rugby their primary career.
Women’s rugby doesn’t need to become women’s basketball to succeed.
It needs to turn the opportunity already in front of it into a sustainable American rugby economy.
Sources
Deloitte Global — Game Changers: Unlocking the Potential of Women’s Sports and Deloitte’s 2026 women’s elite sports revenue forecast.
Women’s Elite Rugby — Official WER league information, 2026 Legacy Cup report and Women’s Elite Rugby Announces Exclusive 2026 Broadcast Partnership With The Women’s Sports Network.
Boston.com / The Boston Globe — Emma Healy, By putting its players’ needs first, Women’s Elite Rugby wants to be the next big thing in pro sports, March 21, 2025.
The Guardian — Women’s Elite Rugby enters season two with lessons learned, a pop star investor and ambition for US game, May 2, 2026.
RugbyPass — Joe Harvey, Landmark first USA Rugby contracts awarded ahead of RWC 2025, May 20, 2025.
NCAA — Women’s sports reach record NCAA participation as leadership roles keep rising, March 2026.
World Rugby — U.S. rugby growth strategy, Pacific Four Series and Rugby World Cup 2031/2033 information.
USA Rugby — Official U.S. high-performance and national-team pathway information.
