Christina Gough
Research expert covering sports and video gaming
National Hockey League - statistics & facts
The National Hockey League (NHL) is the pinnacle of professional ice hockey, attracting the best players from across the world and followed by millions of fans in North America and further afield. Founded in 1917, the league initially comprised five teams, all of which were located in Canada. Today, the NHL encompasses 32 franchises, of which seven can be found in Canada and 25 in the United States.
NHL's biggest franchises
The Edmonton Oilers were tied with the Toronto Maple Leafs as the highest grossing teams in the NHL during the 2023 season, both recording revenues of just over 280 million U.S. dollars. Meanwhile, the Maple Leafs were also the most valuable franchise in the league, with an estimated value of 2.8 billion U.S. dollars in 2023, with the New York Rangers trailing close behind on a valuation of 2.65 billion U.S. dollars. Meanwhile, over half of all NHL franchises had an estimated value of at least one billion U.S. dollars that year, with the average NHL franchise valuation more than doubling between 2020 and 2023.Player salaries
Playing in arguably the highest division of professional ice hockey worldwide can earn players a hefty sum in wages every year. In 2024, the annual salary of the highest paid player in the NHL exceeded 16.5 million U.S. dollars. Auston Matthews, who was the first overall draft pick for the Toronto Maple Leafs in 2016, earned the highest wages in the league that year. He seemed to justify his wage bill as he became the first NHL player in 28 years to score more than 65 goals in a single season in 2023/24. Meanwhile, despite not having the most expensive individual player on their roster, the Tampa Bay Lightning had the highest player expenses in the NHL during the 2022/23 season, almost 20 million U.S. dollars higher than the average team payroll in the NHL that season. The league also provides a minimum annual player salary to protect its athletes, with the figure totaling 750 thousand U.S. dollars in the 2023/24 season.The Stanley Cup
The Stanley Cup is the pinnacle of the NHL season and is the championship trophy awarded to the winners of the league's playoffs. The Montreal Canadiens are the most successful franchise in the league in terms of championships, having won the Stanley Cup 24 times in their history. However, the Canadiens have found success hard to come by in recent years, with their most recent Stanley Cup victory coming back in the 1992/93 season. The most decorated individual player in the NHL is Henri Richard, who won an impressive 11 Stanley Cups during his career with the Canadiens from 1955 to 1975. The average viewership of the championship games experienced a resurgence in 2022, with an average of 4.59 million viewers in the United States tuning into the Stanley Cup games that year, before falling again to 2.6 million in the 2023 season. With such fluctuating viewership figures, it remains to be seen whether the NHL can cement its place as one of the biggest professional sports leagues in the world.
