World Cup broadcast rights unresolved in India and China ahead of kickoff

Millions of football fans in India and China face an unusually late broadcast stalemate as FIFA approaches the 2026 World Cup kickoff with no confirmed rights deal in either country. The tournament opens on June 11, 2026, in the United States, Canada and Mexico, yet two of the world’s biggest media markets remain unresolved.

In India, a Reliance-Disney joint venture offered $20 million for the rights, but FIFA rejected the bid as too low. Sony also held talks over India’s broadcast package but decided not to submit an offer, leaving the market without a confirmed partner as the opening match draws closer.

China remains just as uncertain. No official broadcast decision has been announced, even though FIFA says discussions in both China and India are ongoing and must remain confidential at this stage. FIFA says it has reached agreements with broadcasters in more than 175 territories worldwide, but the two largest population centers in the sport are still outside that list.

The holdout matters far beyond fan frustration. FIFA said China accounted for 49.8% of all viewing hours on digital and social platforms globally during the 2022 World Cup, a reminder of how central the Chinese market has become to the tournament’s commercial and online reach. The absence of a deal there, so close to kickoff, underscores the leverage FIFA is trying to preserve in negotiations over premium rights.

The pattern is also a break from recent World Cups. For the 2018 and 2022 tournaments, Chinese state broadcaster CCTV secured rights well in advance and began airing promotional content weeks before kickoff. That earlier certainty is now gone, replaced by a late-stage deadlock that suggests sports rights have become more expensive, more fragmented and harder for broadcasters to justify at scale.

India’s unresolved status carries a similar warning for the business of global sports. A $20 million bid from the Reliance-Disney joint venture was not enough to satisfy FIFA’s asking price, and Sony’s decision to stay out of the bidding shows how even established players are drawing hard lines in a crowded, high-cost streaming landscape. With less than a month before the first whistle, FIFA has its contracts in most of the world, but not yet in the two markets where the stakes are among the highest.