The WNBA’s opening weekend viewership numbers are in, and the highly anticipated game featuring the four most recent No. 1 overall draft picks just missed breaking last year’s record.
The Dallas Wings defeated the Indiana Fever 107-104 on Saturday, kicking off a four-game slate and becoming the second most-watched regular-season game in league history.
According to the league, an average of 2.49 million viewers tuned in to see Azzi Fudd (2026 No. 1 pick) and Paige Bueckers (2025 No. 1 pick) make their professional debut as teammates against Fever superstar Caitlin Clark (2024 No. 1) and Aliyah Boston (2023 No. 1).
Compared to a similar matchup last season, these numbers represent a slight dip. When Clark’s Fever faced Angel Reese’s Chicago Sky in the second day of the 2025 opening weekend, that game drew 2.7 million viewers.
That contest set a record for the most-watched WNBA regular-season game on ESPN networks and was the most-viewed regular-season game in 25 years, dating back to when NBC originally broadcasted the league.
An early report from longtime media reporter Richard Deitsch noted that “Suns-Mercury averaged 1.15M viewers,” referring to the Phoenix Mercury’s 99-66 blowout win over the defending champion Las Vegas Aces on Saturday. However, there is no WNBA team called the Suns—likely a reference to the Mercury.
The WNBA’s overall opener on Friday also ended in a blowout as the New York Liberty defeated the Connecticut Sun 106-75.
The league’s $2.2 billion, 11-year media deal inked two years ago (now estimated at over $3.1 billion) includes Disney (ABC, ESPN), NBCUniversal (NBC, Peacock), Amazon (Prime Video), Paramount (CBS), Scripps (Ion), USA Sports (USA Network), and NBA TV. For some of these platforms, the league’s milestone 30th season marks their first foray into WNBA broadcasting.
Early viewership numbers have already surfaced, including those for USA Sports’ inaugural WNBA broadcast. An average of 529,000 viewers watched as USA Sports aired the Aces’ 107-78 win over the Los Angeles Sparks on Sunday—an 18% increase from last year’s WNBA regular-season cable average. The Aces’ bounce-back game also had the youngest median age of all national WNBA broadcasts from opening weekend, with women making up 51% of the audience.