More than 16 million people in the United Kingdom watched England’s second consecutive European Championship final win on Sunday, just over a million shy of the 2022 final.
The BBC announced on Monday that a peak of 12.2m viewers tuned in to the match against world champions Spain — which went to penalties after extra time ended with the score at 1-1 — while a peak of 4.2m watched on ITV 1, according to the broadcaster’s press release. An average of 12m watched the duration of the match across both platforms.
A peak audience of 17.4m watched the previous 2022 Euros final which was only shown on BBC One. This year, the final was also shown on ITV simultaneously, splitting the viewing figures into two portions.
ITV had a 25 per cent share of the viewers that watched through television alone for the final but the broadcaster’s highest viewing figures of 2025 came in England’s semi-final against Italy, where viewership peaked at 10.2m.
The increase in engagement extended across mediums in comparison with the previous Euros. Over 1.1m tuned in via BBC Sounds, live commentary on Radio 5 Live and 5 Sports Extra – a 122 per cent increase from 2022. 10.1m signed-in accounts accessed content from the tournament across all of the BBC’s digital services, an increase of 15 per cent. This included content from iPlayer, Sounds and the BBC Sport website and app.
The BBC’s social media accounts also amassed 231m total views across the tournament, with over 100m of those coming from its TikTok account.
The broadcasters shared the rights to the 2023 World Cup and on Sunday secured a similar deal for the 2027 World Cup, meaning the tournament will stay free-to-air for fans in the UK.
In Spain, broadcaster La 1 averaged 6m viewers and a 58 per cent audience share, the highest ever for a women’s football game on Spanish television, according to the EFE news agency.
England conceded first to a Mariona Caldentey header, before Alessia Russo equalised in the second half to send the game to extra time and then penalties. Hannah Hampton’s two saves in the shootout helped secure England’s win, the third Euros victory in a row for head coach Sarina Wiegman after she also won the tournament with the Netherlands in 2017.
(Photo: Niklas Halle’n/AFP via Getty Images)
