Where Watching Athletics Is More (& Less) Popular

The Paris Olympics 2024 kick off with the official opening ceremony on Friday, taking place along a six kilometer stretch of the Seine river, with around 100 heads of state and government as well as some 300,000 spectators expected to attend. Already, French police have started to cordon off parts of the city center with an anti-terrorism perimeter in preparation for the event.

The 100 meter sprint is one of the most prestigious and anticipated events of the Olympic Games. This is reflected in ticket price, with the most expensive tickets for the finals in Athletics priced at €980, which is more than 40 times the price of the cheapest tickets available for each sport.

As part of Statista Consumer Insights’ macro survey, respondents who follow sporting events and leagues were asked whether or not they follow athletics specifically. The highest share of athletics fans in the polled countries was in Finland, where 52 percent of respondents said that they regularly followed the sport. Neighboring Sweden also had a fairly high share at 28 percent.

The following chart shows how athletics spectatorship is popular in China too, where nearly three in ten people who regularly watch sport said they watch track and field. Sports that were even more popular in China, however, were basketball (64 percent), soccer (50 percent) and table tennis (41 percent).

In the United States and the United Kingdom, athletics was less popular overall, with only 14 and 16 percent, respectively, of sports fans saying that they regularly followed it. Lower still, was the share of South Koreans, with only 5 percent selecting the option, versus 62 percent for soccer and 60 percent for baseball.