Resale prices for FIFA World Cup tickets, particularly games involving the host nation team, continue to plummet only three weeks out from the competition.
According to those listed on Ticketdata.com, which aggregates the figures from sites like StubHub and SeatGeek, prices for games involving the United States men’s national soccer team (USMNT) have fallen more than 30 percent over the last month, with seats for the match against Turkey on June 25 dropping by 44 percent.
While resale prices typically slide as events near, the significant declines across nearly every game come amid wider concerns over interest in the competition, with tourism industry analysts and host city hoteliers telling Newsweek that demand appears lackluster compared to what was expected for the biggest sporting event of 2026.
Which Ticket Prices Are Falling?
The U.S. is hosting 78 out of the 104 matches in this year’s World Cup. As of Thursday morning, Ticketdata.com shows resale prices have fallen across all but two, with Saudi Arabia vs. Uruguay up 3 percent and Qatar vs. Switzerland flat.
Prices have fallen by an average of 22 percent across all games over the past 30 days, with several group-stage matches seeing declines of over 40 percent, including Iraq vs. Norway on June 16 (down 57 percent) and Switzerland vs. Bosnia and Herzegovina (down 52 percent).
With prices currently ranging from around $700 to $1,000, USMNT games remain among the most expensive in the competition, but have also seen some of the sharpest declines. As of Thursday, the average 38 percent drop over the past 30 days ranked fourth among all competing nations.
Turkey has seen prices for its team’s games fall by 45 percent, followed by Iraq (40 percent) and Bosnia and Herzegovina (38 percent).
Why Are Prices Dropping?
FIFA President Gianni Infantino has compared the interest in the 2026 tournament to “1,000 years of World Cups at once.”
However, the declining prices underscore a gap between buyer demand and the premiums set by sellers, as well as expectations of further official releases. FIFA has said it will continue releasing match tickets in several waves until the tournament arrives.
But prices on resale websites and FIFA’s official terminal remain significantly higher than previous competitions—one of the reasons some say interest in the competition is lower than forecast.
“FIFA overestimated [the] ticket demand forecast and it is biting them hard,” Scott Friedman, host of the show Ticket Talk, told Newsweek last week.
“FIFA priced tickets too high for all 104 games, complete disaster, and they will be forced to drop them all greatly in next 30+ days,” he added. “A terrible overall ticketing distribution execution for the world’s biggest sporting tournament.”
“FIFA made a bet that demand for the World Cup would be strong enough to support aggressive pricing for all 104 matches, but the odds on that bet were always uneven across games,” according to consumer behavior expert Kate Ashley, a professor at Northeastern University.
Ashley told Newsweek that demand for later-stage games might be sufficient to merit the “very high prices being charged,” but that this will be significantly lower for earlier, less heavily anticipated matches.
She added that, given the ongoing declines, many buyers may now be “sitting on the sidelines” in expectation of prices falling further, resulting in even steeper drops.
In addition to higher prices, others have linked weaker demand to concerns about travel to the U.S.
According to a recent survey of hotel owners and operators by the American Hotel and Lodging Association (AHLA), 80 percent of those in U.S. host markets said bookings were “tracking below initial forecasts.” This figure rose to 85 percent to 90 percent in Kansas City, where demand is “trailing a typical June or July.”
AHLA said that 65 percent to 70 percent of respondents cited visa barriers and “broader geopolitical concerns” as factors that were “significantly suppressing international demand.”
In response to such concerns, the State Department last week said it would be waiving a requirement for visa applicants from certain nations to pay a $15,000 deposit when traveling to the U.S., provided they have a ticket for the competition.
“The United States is excited to organize the biggest and best FIFA World Cup in history,” Assistant Secretary of State for Consular Affairs Mora Namdar told Newsweek in a statement.
