LaLiga Furthers Its International Expansion Efforts in the UK, USA, and Beyond

Over a decade ago, at the conclusion of the 2015/16 season, LaLiga was the greatest league in Europe in terms of top-end team quality. The UEFA Champions League Final has just seen the two Madrid sides battle it out, Sevilla romped to a third successive Europa League title, and FC Barcelona were, obviously, still a huge force in football.

Even so, LaLiga couldn’t match the more global appeal – and subsequent colossal revenues – of the Premier League. Much of this was down to competitiveness. Where the Premier League has long shared its hefty revenues, LaLiga would skew huge portions towards its top two clubs. However, marketing and reach were also issues.

Since then, efforts have been made to become much more global as a league entity. Knowing how well-stocked LaLiga is with footballing talent, even if much of it is very concentrated in the two often featured as favourites in football tips, the Spanish football heads know that there's a great product to be sold to the world right here.

Seeking Premier League Revenues and UK Exposure

🇪🇸 Premier Sports are delighted to announce a partnership with LaLiga including the launch of the LaLigaTV channel bundled as part of Premier Sports.* 9 LIVE LaLiga games this weekend 🙌 Full press release: https://t.co/iUp10yRnMY #LaLiga | @LaLigaEN | @LaLiga https://t.co/WOzwtf9nov

— Premier Sports (@PremSportsTV) September 10, 2019

LaLiga will never overtake the Premier League or even the Championship in the UK, but there is a plethora of football fans who want to see more Spanish football, and the cash is there to deliver. After all, the English top flight has set the bar for international revenues.

In 2023/24, the EPL shared equal payments from international revenues, to the sum of £55.7 million to each club. The total international revenues pool even extended a further £237 million on top, which was divided up as extra merit payments. However, the key to this revenue stream for the English league is finding the right broadcasters.

It’d be fair to say that LaLiga isn’t exactly on popular platforms in the UK. Its primary sports broadcast partner is Premier Sports, which ranks well behind Sky Sports and TNT. It’s also accessible via Disney+, which, while popular for its entertainment catalogue, likely isn’t being subscribed to for its LaLiga streams.

The league is also trying to break into other online entertainment arenas. The arrival of LaLiga Grand Chance at the UK casino is a clear sign of trying to reach new audiences in a somewhat more subtle way. It’s a fully branded and official game that lets football fans both enjoy the entertainment medium as well as engage with LaLiga clubs.

Strong Figures from Years of Effort

Villarreal and Barcelona’s La Liga match in Miami has been postponed, with organisers saying there is insufficient time to organise the event. Full story from @AdamCrafton_ ⤵️

— The Athletic | Football (@TheAthleticFC) October 21, 2025

For a long time, El Clásico has been LaLiga’s biggest selling point, forged from the issues of pumping funds and marketing efforts into just two clubs. Since Valencia’s triumph in 2003/04, only Atlético Madrid have broken the duopoly, doing so in 2013/14 and 2020/21, which can be chalked up as anomalies in the grand scheme of LaLiga.

Essentially, when the weekend football tips get marked up, you can bet that Real Madrid and Barcelona will be amongst the most favoured teams to win in European football. They've become so dominant that the two-horse race for the title is just accepted, and while upsets still occur, even a handful of them aren't enough to stop the familiar one-two finish in LaLiga.

Despite this, interest in LaLiga and its visibility overseas has increased. From 2015 to 2022, the global audience size for broadcasts grew by 30 percent while audiovisual rights saw a 247 percent surge in value from 2013 to 2022. Last year, LaLiga celebrated its support of broadcast partners by adding 105 additional activations, such as giveaways.

The next big step for LaLiga looked set to be hosting a competitive league match over in the US. This was met with tremendous uproar from not only Spain’s buzzing football fan base, but fans across Europe. LaLiga wants to break into the US just as the Premier League has, targeting its hefty Spanish-speaking population, but this was a step too far.

By all accounts, LaLiga is succeeding in its efforts to become more global. It’s quite some way off from the Premier League, but the foundations are there to showcase much more competitive installments, should they come along.