Which Canadian sports are the most popular?

The Canadian soccer team has just made a good impression at the football World Cup in Qatar.

Okay they didn’t win a game and were eliminated before the knockout rounds, but qualifying was a big demonstration of the improvements in Canadian soccer. And the team showed enough guile, energy and organisation to win over plenty of fans on the big worldwide stage.

Canadian sports teams seem to be advancing in all directions. Who would have imagined that the Canadian cricket team would be gradually moving up the world rankings?
Meanwhile the country’s baseball teams are becoming highly rated, particularly the women’s. And Canada is number one in the world at curling and second at lacrosse.

But there’s one sport that stands head and shoulders above the others in Canada. Canadians love hockey. Their men’s hockey team is the number one ranked in the world, while the women’s team is the number two ranked in the world. The vast majority of Canadians love to play, watch and talk about hockey. They also love to try to predict the outcome of the big matches too.

Everyone has their own opinion on the sports betting odds for the big hockey games. And everyone loves to comment on how right they were after the games.
Ice hockey is played all over the country and at all times of year. Sports experts estimate that around one and half million Canadians play hockey at some point during an average year.

The levels of professionalism are shown by the latest figures revealing that there are over half a million registered Canadian hockey players with the International Ice Hockey Federation. With a population of around 37 million people that’s an impressive proportion of players per head.

And it’s not just taking part – Canadians love watching their ice hockey too. At the heart of all this enthusiasm is the National Hockey League.

Attendances at live matches are large. Teams like Vancouver for example, can average over 17,000 spectators at each home tie. The games are also watched by huge TV audiences too. That’s why the NHL is a huge enterprise generating billions of dollars.

Toronto Maple Leafs for example is a franchise recently valued at 1.8 billion US dollars. Others like Montreal Canadiens and Edmonton Oilers are not far behind in valuations.
It’s not hard to see where these valuations derive from. The sport is hugely popular with advertisers and the average ticket prices for attending games are rising.

The ticket prices for the two most popular Canadian teams are a good example. Toronto Maple Leafs tickets are on average over US $128 and for the Montreal Canadiens they are more than US$90 on average.

Canadians’ love of sport

The love of hockey shows how the Canadians are a big sports-mad nation. Canadians love many different sports – both playing and watching them.
And sports fans in Canada do have other choices than hockey of course.

Canadian football

Football draws big audiences. Canadian football is slightly different to its American counterpart. Teams comprise 12 players and compete in the CFL.

Less people take part than in hockey, but sometimes more watch football. The Grey Cup is now one of Canada’s biggest sporting events. Almost half the population watch this annual football showdown.

And like hockey, the top end of football can be extremely lucrative. The Winnipeg Blue Bombers, for example, took the Grey Cup title again in 2021. The result was that the club was able to report an operating profit figure of $2.1 million for the year.

Canadian Soccer

Meanwhile Canadian soccer is more of a fledgling operation. Insiders are hoping the national men’s team’s qualification for the World Cup Finals will provide a boost for the sport.
It is already thought that the women soccer team’s Olympic Gold medal is boosting the female game in Canada.

The men’s team is expected to generate at least $10 million from FIFA for qualifying for the finals in Qatar. The actual spin-off in advertising, promotion and audiences is likely to be a lot higher.

The boost to soccer is expected to continue with more funding opportunities arising. Canada is one of the co-hosts for the 2026 World Cup along with Mexico and USA.

Canadian Lacrosse

Lacrosse is a much more traditional Canadian sport. It has been officially declared as the country’s national summer sport. The highest level of the sport is the National Lacrosse League and the leading three professional teams in it.

It may be a racket-and-ball sport that’s little known worldwide, but more than 100,000 Canadians are estimated to play lacrosse.

And that’s not all. Canadians are also big players of basketball, rugby, tennis, golf, swimming and volleyball. Whatever they play, the Canadians seem to be good – and if they’re not good at least they’re enthusiastic!