Most Popular Sports in India Olympics Stats Most Popular Sports in India 1) Cricket: Cricket is by far the most popular sport in India. India has produced some of the finest cricketers in the world who hold or once held various world records. India won the cricket world cup in 1983 and recently the first ever T20 world cup in 2007. In recent times, India has also emerged as the country where the maximum amount of money in Cricket is involved. The cash rich and glamorous IPL (Indian Premier League) attracts cricketers from all over the world. Indian cricketers Sachin Tendulkar and MS Dhoni are the highest earning crickers (by way of prizes and endorsements) in the world as of 2010. Cricket popularity 2) Football (Soccer): Soccer is second most popular sport in India. Despite the fact that the Indian soccer team stands at around 139th position in the world according to FIFA rankings (2010), the sport has many fans in the country, especially in certain regions like West Bengal, Goa and many states in North-East India. There are only a handful FIFA approved stadiums in the country.

Badminton popularity 5) Tennis: Tennis has long been a popular sport in India. Though India has not been a powerful force in the singles event, it has often done very well in the doubles and mixed doubles category. As of 2010, Leander Paes and Sania Mirza are among the most successful male and female tennis players in the country. A decade or two ago, tennis courts were a rarity even in big cities but that has slowly changed. These days, it is not hard to find tennis courts in educational institutes, big apartment complexes and clubs in Indian cities. chi said on 2014-06-04 00:48:15: i am christian Souvik Samanta said on 2014-04-02 13:06:14: CRICKET is the best forever. aleksi said on 2014-02-11 13:45:36: motherfuckin indians soccer is the one!!!!

this is a ducked up list wrestling ,basketball,motorsports .golf, no one cares about these sports in india they should not even feature in these lists i dont know which illogical and foolish mind made this list -Abhay Singh Love to see this number :-) Although I'm an all sports lover, I love cricket to the max. My order to watch would be like this Cricket--Probably there needs no explanation as I'm from India. :-) Football(soccer) only at the time of worldcup, Euro, and at times ( for EPL and EUFA) Tennis followed very well at the time of only grandslams(AUS, Wimbledon, French and US Opens).[But this sport is seen when top 4 ranks play these days, ie Nadal, Federer, Murray, Medvedev..Djokovic etc. After Sampras, Agassi, Chang, Rafter era this has become weak in India till Federer and Nadal reached prime states. And in woman after Steffi, Sanchez, Pierce, Monica, Martina Hingis and to an extent Williams' sisters (though they are still there) era probably its not followed by many. And these days it has become fashion parade :-).

Then you have Field Hockey although many love it there is no craze these days due to poor show by the national team for decades. But people will throng the stadiums when National team plays. And I guess people will not surf net for this for many reasons. Then you have Chess and caroms although they dont come unders sports as such :-) And you have selected people for sports like Snooker, Billiards, Golf, Polo, Grandpix When it comes to play Apart from Cricket, what people love to play are Chess, cricket rocksssssssssssssssssss and football suckssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss -Kapil Bhardwaj94 wt abt hockey???? -Shah rukh Khan Thanks for the reply and explanation. I can see the difficulties in collecting the kind of data and stats i was expecting, but i understand that it's an ongoing project and will evolve over time. I wish you all the very best and I hope to see more inclusive data being used in future. -Buntyweb Field Hockey is certainly much more popular in India than soccer or football.. by any standards you might want to employ..

not more than 0.1% of the population would be able to name even 1 American football team.. and i am not able to connect to the site using my facebook a/c due to site error... "An error occurred with Most Popular Sports. Please try again later." -Buntyweb Field Hockey is certainly much more popular in India.. by any standards you might want to employ.. and i am not able to connect using my facebook a/c.. -Buntyweb Where is hockey. Hockey is 2nd most popular sport in India after our religion CRICKET. What football we don't know football, Indians hate football. -mahesh patil where field hockey man it must have got at least the 3rd pos -rohan Thanks for the feedback. As metioned above, the list is based on which "individual sports" websites internet users in the country browse the most (based on Alexa traffic ranks). All country-wise lists are generated automatically using those stats - definitely a limitation of the website currently. For India, unfortunately, dedicated field-hockey websites are not as popular as websites like NFL.com . Thus, this list represents popularity among internet users, which may not be true representative of whole country's population.

(Thi is definitely a limitation that we have tried to convey above). Very soon, we will provide more detailed stats and use multiple means of measuring sports popularity, not just website traffic analysis. -Admin what?????????????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! -bhy field hockey is the no.2 sport in india as per popularity, football is popular only in metros (dont include mumbai) but yes the internate search is less than that of football becusefootball is worlds most populer sport and have many superstars. whenever indian team plays any gameof hockey it always a full housein india. -farewell Correction: India stands now in 170 # of Fifa Ranking, below giants as Faroe Islands, Curaçao Island and other great microscopic Islands with a couple thousands population. India should hide the fact that soccer is the seconds most popular sport, is kinda embarassing not to say unbelievable. -Mota why do you think cricket is the most popular sport in India? -Sothearath_chantrea Most Popular Team Sports: Soccer & cricket ,basketball & baseball ??? | Bleacher Report Most Popular Team Sports: Soccer & cricket ,basketball & baseball ???

Use your ← → (arrow) keys to browse more stories (Photo by Doug Pensinger/Getty Images) 27.2K 2 Comments Most popular team sports:-Soccer the emperor, Cricket the king with a brigade of prince-basketball, baseball, rugby (union &league), hockey (field & ice), volleyball and football. 1. Association football: Soccer has the largest fan following in the modern world- ranging from north to south ,east to west ,rich to poor, young to old everyone love the beautiful game, which has Chinese origin discovered by the English. It has fanatical following in Europe with 499.7 million population, South America; population 382 million, Africa; population 922 million, Indonesia ; population 230million and Mexico(109 million ),and has abundance support in the largest continent –second most popular sports in Japan ;population 140 million, China; population 1320 million ,India ; population1160 million and figures itself amongst the top three ,almost in entire Asia .

It is the de facto sports in 93 countries, has 208 member nations and counts its crazy fans in billions and thus easily, the richest sports. It has the largest contingent of die hard fans, players and professional leagues in the World’s largest economy, Europe. The English premier league and the Champions League are the most popular football leagues, with passionate fans of half a billion in 202 countries, where the matches are shown live. Manchester United is the richest club in the world with a valuation of $1.87 billion. The FIFA World Cup is the largest and most lucrative sporting event in the world. The 2006 FIFA world cup, with 64 matches amongst 32 nations with television coverage in 214 countries has a cumulative television audience of 26 billion people, where the final game between defending champion Italy v/s French drew 700 million individuals. Population strength: Played in 208 member nations, fanatical following as no.1 sports in 93 countries with combine population of 2 billion and amongst the top 3 popular sports in around 100 countries with 3 billion populations.

Economics: Its the world richest sports that can be played by the poorest of the poor. The domestic leagues in Europe have collective valuation in excess of $30 billion and the other various leagues add up another $10 billon. The FIFA World Cup can boast the host country’s economy by upwards of $10 billion. 2. Cricket : Twenty20 cricket, the three hour 20 over a side match along with ODI ;50 over a side and Test match ;the traditional form( up to 5 days) is the second most popular sports in the world. The English gentleman’s game is the most popular sports in the subcontinent which has 1.5 billion populations. Crazy fans with religion like following dwell in India; population 1162 million ,Pakistan (166 million), Bangladesh (162 million), Srilanka (20 million), Nepal (29 million), West Indies and the 20 million odd non residential Indians, that can be matched only by soccer buffs of Europe and South America. It is amongst the top three most popular sports in Australia, England, South Africa, Kenya, Zimbabwe, New Zeeland, Afghanistan and Mauritius.

ICC has 104 member nations with 10 test playing nations and cherishes the most popular tag in 20 countries. The ICC cricket World Cup is the second largest single sporting events in the world (3rd if Olympics considered), drawing a cumulative television audience of 5 billion people where a final involving India could draw up to 400 million individuals (considering India has 130 million television sets).BCCI is the richest sporting organization in the world with a valuation in excess of $2 billion, where they need not pay any taxes to the government. Indian premier league, a 59 matches Twenty20 tournament amongst 8 Indian cites, attracting 2 billion eyeballs is the most popular and richest in the cricket world where the average attendance figure (57,500) is preceded by only American football (67,000). India is the defending twenty20 world cup champion and Australia in ODI. Population strength: The English national sport is the most popular sports in 20 countries with combine population of 1.6 billion, amongst the top 3 sports in 10 nations with a population in excess of 200 million.

Economics: India is the nerve centre of cricket economics with 75% of the global funding. Twenty20 cricket is the most commercially viable with IPL alone has a valuation in excess of $ 2 billion, though only in its 2nd year. BCCI is the richest national sporting organization in the world, who promises World cup 2011 as big as FIFA World cup if not better. 3. Basketball: The most popular sports of Philippines, where dwells 92 million crazy fans is amongst the most popular sports in USA ; population 306 million, China( 1337 million),Russia(141 million), Argentina(40 million),Canada(33 million), Germany(82 million), Italy(60 million), Spain and Puerto Rico. National Basketball Association (NBA), with 30 teams having an average attendance of 17,500 per match is one of the richest and most popular basketball leagues and, arguably the most viewed and sought after American sporting events in the world, which attracts an accumulative television audience in excess of a billion.

Induction of players of different nationalities to the NBA has ignited the general population to take up and follow the sport in a big way across various nations. FIBA world championship and Olympics are the major international events where Spain and the United States is the current gold medalist respectively. Population strength: An American invention is the most popular sports in Philippines, amongst top 3 most popular sports in more than 10 countries with a combine population of 1.8 billion. Economics: 90 % of basketball money is in the United States with NBA teams generating in excess of $3.3 billion in revenue. Chicago Bulls is the most popular and the richest club. 4. Baseball: The national pastime of the United States ,has cricket as its origin and is the most popular sports in Japan; population127 million ,Taiwan(23million), Cuba(11 million) ,Venezuela(28 million) and South Korea(48 million). It is amongst the most popular in the USA(309 million), Mexico(109 million),Puerto Rico ,Canada, Columbia ,Panama, the Netherlands Antilles, Nicaragua and Dominic republic .

With 117 member nations it has passionate fans nearing half a billion mark and, arguable the richest bat and ball game. Major league baseball is the premier baseball league and attracts the highest numbers of attendance(79.5 million in 2430 matches) , by far the most in any sporting leagues of the world .New York Yankees is the most valued and popular club raking in millions to adhere the billionaire club . After preamble of not so popular baseball World cup the international think-tank initiated the successful World baseball classic, a 16 nations tournaments with MLB players, where Japan is the multiple defending champion. Korea is the most recent Olympic gold medalist. Population strength: Most popular sports in 5 countries with a population of 240 million, amongst top 3 popular sports in more than half a dozen nations with 450 million population, and has fan base in 10 other countries with a population of about a billion. Economics: Baseball is the richest bat and ball game with MLB contributing an average annual income of close to $6 billion ($6.5 billion in 2008) and the Japanese League (NBP) with a valuation in excess of $1 billion.

5.Rugby union: An English invention ,out of soccer is a very popular sports in South Africa ; population 48 million ,United Kingdom; population 61 million, Australia (28 million), France(65 million), Italy(60 million), Madagascar, Fiji, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, ,Cook Islands, Romania ,Samoa, Tonga, Argentina and de facto sports in New Zealand. It is also played in USA, Japan, Georgia, Belgium, Germany, Chile, Paraguay, Malaysia, Russia, Canada and Spain. The Rugby world cup, a 16 nations` tournament, is the 3rd largest single sporting event achieving average attendance upward 45,000 people and, an estimated television audience in excess of 2 billion individuals. The Six nations cup involving England, Italy, Wales, France, Ireland, & Scotland and the Tri nation series( Australia, New Zealand & South Africa) are the major tournaments outside the world cup, followed by millions of passionate rugby fans. South Africa is the defending World champion where else Ireland is in the Six nations cup. International Rugby Board (IRB) has 103 member nations spanning across six continents.

Population strength: It is the most popular sports in New Zealand and amongst top 3 popular sports in more than 10 countries with a population of 300 million. It has a fan base in around 20 countries with half a billion people. Economics: It’s a rich international tournament with a total valuation of about $2 billion with Lion’s Tour being a major contributor apart from the world cup, Six Nations, Tri Series and professional club leagues across Europe. 6.Field Hockey: The national sports of India and Pakistan, invented by the British is amongst the top five sports in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Germany, Holland( 6 times world champion) ,Australia(3 Olympics gold), South Korea , Japan , Argentina ,Malaysia and England . Olympics and the world cup are prominent sporting events, dominated by India; winning 8 Olympics gold and Pakistan; winning 4 world cups in the early part of 21st century but lost its gloss in the later part to Australia, Spain, Germany, Argentina and the Netherlands.

Passionate hockey fans are limited to Punjab regions and Malaysia ,but has a consistent fan following across the world .The Champions Trophy and the Sultan Azlan Shah hockey tournament are other prominent field hockey tournaments .International Hockey federation(FIH) has more than 100 hockey playing countries . Germany is the current defending World champion and Olympic gold medalist. Population strength: Though not the most popular sports in any nations, has a support base in more than 20 countries with a combine population of 2 billion. It is amongst the top 5 sports in more than 5 countries with 1.5 billion populations. Economics: It is not a multibillion dollar game, with international matches contributing 90% of the global funding. 7.Volleyball: The national sports of Srilanka is a very popular participant sports in almost all countries particularly in the United States ,Brazil, Canada, Russia, Italy, the Netherlands ,Japan, China, India, Philippines and Polland .Volleyball is a popular sports in south of India, North America, Eastern Europe and Brazil ,enjoying a surge in popularity in schools and colleges.

The most important tournament is the Olympics with the USSR, Brazil and the USA are multiple gold medalist, amongst the 12 participating nations. FIVB is the international governing body with more than 150 volleyball playing nations, holds a world championship every 4 years. The United States is the current Olympic gold medalist and Brazil the defending world Champion. Another hugely popular version is beach volleyball which often rivals even the main sport. Population strength: Every nations love to play volleyball in spite of not being the darling to any, amongst the top 5 sports in a dozen of nations with a combine population of 1 billion. It has a fan base in more than 150 countries. Economics: Volleyball is a billion dollar sport played professionally in the United States, Canada and Brazil. It is also big in European markets. 8.Ice Hockey: Though a winter sport but now with the advent of artificial turf the sport enjoys popularity throughout the seasons ,particularly in the United States, Russia, Canada, Norway , Sweden , Denmark, Finland, Czech Republic, Great Britain and Slovakia where dwells a population of about half a billion.

National Hokey League is the most popular hockey league and captures the lion’s share among all the hockey leagues, pulling an average crowd of 40,000 per match to the stadiums in the US and millions of television audience across Europe and America. International Ice Hockey federation with 66 members holds the ice hockey world championship where Russia is the defending champion, continental cup, champions’ hockey league and Victoria cup. Ice Hockey has been one of the major attractions in winter Olympics with Canada sweeping six of the first seven gold. Population strength: Its amongst the top 4 popular sports in around 10 nations with a population of 500 million, has fan base spreading around 20 countries Economics: Ice hockey is one of the major north American professional sports riding high with a valuation in excess of $ 10 billion in North America and another couple of billion dollars in Europe. 9. American football: The most popular sport in the United States, having its roots in English soccer and rugby football is the beloved of more than half of its total population (306 million people).

With over 200 million passionate football fans residing across United States, Canada, Japan, Caribbean’s and Europe it is one of the most popular sports sheer to its mass appeal and glamour. National Football league (NFL) is the richest sporting league in the world netting in $6.2 billion annually and is the world record holder for average attendance of around 67,700 which hits around a billion eyeballs. IFAF, with 45 members is the international governing body that overseas American football world cup where United States is the defending champion. Outside United States and Canada it is also played domestically in United Kingdom, Spain, The Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Austria, Mexico and Japan, the multiple world champions in 1999 and 2003. Population strength: The most popular sport in the United states, in a country of 306 million people, has fans scattered around a dozen nations with a population exceeding half a billion. Economics: NFL is the richest sporting league in the world with an annual average revenue in excess of $6 billion, where players are multimillionaires. Out of the 32 NFL teams 19 are billionaires thus making the total valuation in excess of $25 billion.

10. Rugby league: It’s the other version of rugby football played extensively in Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Wales, France, England and Papua New Guinea, where it is considered as national sports. It is played in more the 30 nations, growing in popularity particularly in Europe and New Zealand after being crowned the defending world champion. Passionate rugby league fans dwells mainly in northern parts of England, Australia and New Zealand. National Rugby league, with 16 teams is the most prominent domestic league, and probably the most popular rugby football club competitions in the world, drawing in huge crowds across the grounds of Australia and New Zealand. In 2007 the NRL grand finale was amongst the most watched television show in Australia. a)Population strength: The sport is amongst the most popular in more than half a dozen nations with a combine population of 170 million. b) Economics: It’s a multimillionaire game with its centric economics in Australasia. Ranking sports’ popularity: And the silver goes to... | The Economist And the silver goes to... Sep 27th 2011, 11:04 Tweet WHICH sport is the world's favourite?

The answer, football, feels so self-evident that it is barely worth a post. But what about the world's second favourite? In 2005 England was in the thrall of a glorious cricketing summer. That year's Ashes series, a biennial battle in which Australia used to thrash England (before gloating about it insufferably), was going to the wire. Five wonderfully close Test matches had brought the country to a standstill. (It even knocked The World's Favourite Sport off of the back pages for a while.) Out of curiosity, I checked out the American press to see whether news of this parochial clash obsessing England had made it across the pond. It was with pride that I saw that it had made the New York Times (if I remember correctly), albeit in a report so hidden away that it seemed surprised to be found. The article stated—casually, with no supporting evidence—that cricket was the “world's second most popular sport”. The next day I saw the claim again, equally unsubstantiated, in the British version of the Times.

I was reminded of this recently by a comment on our inaugural Game Theory post: “After soccer/football, what is the world's SECOND most popular sport?...I heard it may be cricket, but controversy abounds.” It got me wondering how one defines a sport's popularity. The first definition that leaps to mind is the number of people watching it on television. But does one measure a single sporting event, or the number of people who watch a game over the year? The only time a billion people have watched a single sporting-related event was the opening ceremony at the Beijing Olympics in 2008, according to futures sport+entertainment , a consultancy. In fact it is the most-watched TV programme of all time. Still, I don't think a cutesy Chinese kid lip-synching a sickly song about how the world is one happy family really counts as sport. Kevin Alavy, the director of futures sport+entertainment, says that “broadly speaking, the FIFA World Cup and the Summer Olympics are by far the two most-watched sporting events, with the UEFA European Championships ranked third.

There's then quite a large gap to…the FIA Formula One World Championship, NFL Super Bowl and the IOC Winter Olympics.” So where does cricket fit in? By these figures it seems preposterous to advance it as the world's second favourite. However, the number of people watching its showpiece, the World Cup Final, is wholly dependent on whether India has made it through. It would be of little surprise to me if, in a non-Olympic or World Cup summer, this year's final between India and Sri Lanka—in Mumbai—was the most-watched sporting event in 2011. Yet I don't think these one-offs are a good indicator. In 2008, the second-most watched sporting event (not featuring cutesy kids and the like) was a volleyball game between China and Cuba. I've accidentally sat through a baseball game on television. But I'm not a fan and I don't want my name chalked up alongside it when awards for popularity are handed out. Which leaves us with the notion of “regular” viewers. Here, cricket might be a viable contender for second.

What is important is not that it is a global sport—very few countries give a hoot about it—but that it is phenomenally popular in two places, India and Pakistan, whose combined population makes up over a fifth of the world's total. In contrast, American football attracts little attention outside the United States, which has just a quarter of India's population. Supporting from the stands How about attendance figures? By this measure Major League Baseball (MLB) storms it. In 2010 combined attendance was over 73m, although it has the advantage of a stupendous number of games in a season—2,424. The second-most attended sporting league in the world is also in baseball—Japan's Nippon Professional Baseball, with over 22m spectators in 2009. In contrast, the English Premier League attracts just 13.2m to its stadia. Indeed, football's six most attended leagues—England's Premier League (EPL), Germany's Bundesliga, Spain's La Liga, England's Championship, Italy's Serie A and French Ligue 1—muster fewer specatators between them, with 64m, than MLB alone.

Then again, most have a mere 300-400 games in a season, meaning that the average attendance per game is comparable (30,138 for MLB and 34,780 for the EPL, for example). The best average attendances are at NFL games (66,960) followed by the Bundesliga (42,673). We might also consider revenue. According to Deloitte , the EPL's revenue in the 2009-10 season was €2.3 billion ($3.1 billion), with football in the whole of Europe generating a combined €16.3 billion. This compares with NFL's $9 billion, MLB's $7.2 billion and the NBA's $4.1 billion in 2011, according to Plunkett Research . Comparable revenue figures for the Indian Premier League, cricket's big money-spinning event, are hard to come by. But Brand Finance, a British consultancy, estimated the IPL's brand value to be $4.1 billion in 2010. Are there other measures we can use? The number of Google hits is a tempting proxy.

However, this is problematic for two reasons. First, it will favour sports that are popular in countries with high internet penetration. Even if one could adjust for that, however, there is still the issue of the word “football”, which encompasses both the world game and gridiron. If you type “football” into Google, you get 1.5 billion returns. “Soccer”, which relatively few people outside America use, gets 740m, while “American football”, used exclusively outside the United States, notches 36m. So it is likely the big majority of those 1.5 billion refer to the roundball game. “Basketball” gets you 627m hits, “cricket” 351m (although some of these might be of the six-legged variety); “golf” 271m; “volleyball” 177m and “Formula 1” 90m. An alternative test would be how many people can recognise a star player.

This would give the individual sports a boost, since stars like Roger Federer and Michael Schumacher have their faces adorned on billboards around the world—although I also refuse to believe there is a single person on the subcontinent who would be unable to put a name to a picture of Sachin Tendulkar (27m Google hits, pictured above). And there are probably undiscovered Amazonian tribes that could finger David Beckham (67m). Still, what share of people who could name Tiger Woods are really golf fanatics? So my proposed test is as follows: can you fully explain the most arcane rule in the sport you purport to follow—lbw in cricket, offside in football or what is happening virtually any time the ref blows his whistle in rugby? This would surely sort the true fans. Now we just need to find someone to pay for the survey. UPDATE: Many of the comments have asked why we haven't included participation rates in the post. It was an obvious oversight, so I have had a dig around for some stats. Unfortunately, I don't think they add much clarification. The National Sporting Goods Association publishes a list for the United States.

But it ranks walking, a sport apparently enjoyed by 95.8% of Americans over seven years of age, at number one. The first real sport we come to is swimming, in which just over half of Americans participate. In Britain, depending on your source, the most popular sports by participation are either swimming or angling. But clearly, not everyone who happens to take a dip is partaking in the sport of swimming. I would argue we should only include organised participation. So only people who play for a Sunday league football side, not those who play in the park with jumpers for goalposts; people who run a race, not every jogger. Compiling that list, I suspect, would be a full-time project. World's Most Viewed Sports Sport > World > Lists > Most Popular Sports > Most Viewed The World's Most Viewed Sports This is part of our discussion about the world's most popular sports . When discussing this question, there is a difference between most viewed sports (e.g. most fans) versus the most played sports around the world. Here is a discussion about the number of people who watch and support sport around the world. See also the discussion about the most played sports .

Have your say too, vote in our poll - What is your favorite sport to WATCH? Most Fans, Most Viewed On a widely circulated list of popular sports based on fans , soccer is rightly so in the top position. The FIFA World Cup held every four years has a huge TV audience - an accumulated audience of over 30 billion people watched the 2006 World Cup in Germany (I know that's more than the world's population, this figure is an 'accumulated' audience, meaning if people watched more than one game, which most people did, they were counted each time). When you talk of most viewed sports, the TV and now online audience greatly grows the number of viewers compared to those who physically go to watch sporting events. Cricket is second on this list despite not being played in many parts of the world, due to its huge popularity on the subcontinent (there are 1 billion Indians!). Field hockey is third, and is another popular sport spread around the world by the English though it did not take off in the US. The internet is a great source of information about the sports which people interested in. A limitation of using the online audience is that they do not necessarily represent a world wide view.

The information available tends to have a US bias, so popular US sports such as basketball, baseball and American football are highly represented. In a comparison of many lists , including some online votes and others which were personal opinion, the popular US sports basketball and baseball are in the top four. One way of gauging popularity is by internet traffic to sports websites. Comparing the most popular Wikipedia sports pages , in addition to soccer/world football, the popular US sports basketball, American football and baseball were all in the top 5. In fact in 2009 the basketball wikipedia page was visited more often than the Soccer and Association Football pages combined (2010 was the FIFA World Cup and greatly boosted soccer page views). On the Olympic website , the aquatics pages are most popular, and on this website , Adventure Sports pages are most viewed. The problem using internet traffic is that it often reflects only the English speaking parts of the world, and then only people who have internet access. Online voting can still not agree, one found soccer top while the other most favorite sport was cricket . It is important to consider all the population of the world and sports in all regions.

Another analysis of popular sports in the media conducted by the IOC and said to represent a world-wide analysis is the study of newspaper articles during the Olympics . Although some popular world sports (such as cricket) are not on the Olympic program, the study found that during the 2004 Olympic Games Track & Field and Swimming were written about most, ahead of soccer. These same top sports also head the list of pages most viewed on the IOC website . Some sports, such as swimming, athletics and gymnastics, undergo a huge surge in popularity every four years during the Olympics, and are not so popular at other times. The popularity of sports is not uniform around the world. Another study by the IOC looking at which sports are played most widely around the world , based on the number of National Federations for each sport, found Volleyball and Basketball ahead of the sport usually considered to be most widespread, Soccer, and the other 'universal sport' of running (Track and Field). There is further analysis of regional differences in sport popularity . Popularity is also related to the personalities in the sport and access to TV and other media.

Golfer Tiger Woods was the highest paid and probably the highest profile sportsman in the decade 2000-2010. This is reflected in another comparison of popular online sport term searches , where golf is only just behind the generic term football, which encompasses several sport codes. This reflects the high number of TV golf fans, personalities as well as recreational golf players. Share: Most Popular Sports in Australia all about sport in Australia Old Comments how the hell is football (soccer) not number one in participants, any other reliable news research would highlight that it by far has the most participants in aus, also is much higher in terms of attendances than cricket (i think i saw about 25 people at the last sheffield shield match) and would only be lower than afl and nrl possibly, this list is a joke (from brandon, Mar 2013) I personally respect the Aussies for this one thing- they don't play all sports but the ones they do, they're absolutely brilliant at.

World champions in Hockey, Best team in cricket and rugby league, one of the best in rugby union, they have the opening race and Grand Slam of the F1 and Tennis season respectively...just fantastic (from Chinmay, Mar 2013) Netball is an ever increasing participation sport amongst Aussie girls and woman! (from Cara, Mar 2013) Interesting. As an American sports fan, I associate Australia with tennis: the "dinkum Aussies" such as Emerson, Laver, Rosewall, and Newcombe. But of course, the most popular sport here is also one that no one else in the world plays: a game that a professor of mine in Ireland unforgettably described as "a cross between rugby union and Buck Rogers." I speak of the dimwitted spectacle that Americans simply call "football." (from Harry, Feb 2013) I'm from India but I personally love aussie cricket team even more than indian cricket team, they are undisputed cricketing champions just look at the world class aussie cricketers Sir don bradman, steve waugh, ponting, lilly, warne ,mcgrath, watson, warner etc etc.

i never miss australia's cricket match telecasted on indian tv channel. (from The_superstud, Feb 2013) dun no abt australia but in India. cricket = life we breath, live, love & die on cricket. there's no day without playing or wathching cricket, the biggest n best sport in the world (by d diehard fan of cricket frm 'The great India', the_superstud, Feb 2013) i think all the sports are popular but personaly i love cricket (from niki, Jan 2013) of course it is cricket ... Surfing? (from Bob blythe, Jan 2013) AFL would have to be the most attended (i asume watched) followed by cricket and my be moter racing or rugby. Rugby may be even futher down than that a big crowed for them is 14,000. In the AFL i know their are clubs that average 60,000 per game for the season. The most participants would have to be cricket, in every town, city and school oval has cricket played on it friday eevning, satureday and sunday afternoons.

i know in Melbourne there are heaps of compititions and you can't drive more that a km and see a game being played on and oval. (from shane, Dec 2012) What is the most unpopular sport in australia? (from billy, Nov 2012) Australians.. love each game individually ... They love Warnie,PUP.. when they rip English ... And they love Rugby/AFL in winters ... They talk about a game when it gets lot of media hype (from CCD, Nov 2012) How the hell is cricket at number 6 and 7 in lists 2 and 3? Easily has most participants and spectators than the others with exception of possibly GAYFL. Although I'd say AFL and Cricket are about even - ave AFL game sees 36000 and cricket pulls that in every day of a test match (from Larry, Nov 2012) 1. AFL, 2. Cricket, 3. Rugby League, Than swimming and athletics I guess. AFL -> NRL -> Cricket. Those are the top 3 most popular sports in Aus (in order). Personal opinion but when you look at the facts this seems right.

(from daj, Sept 2012) The country where 75,000 at first day of test come to watch match how can any one named the other game as aus fav (from naqeeb lawoon frm pak, Sept 2012) more participants in aus in golf than cricket ... you gotta be kidding me ... and more attendance in soccer and motor sports than in cricket ... who makes this lists??? have you seen the size of MCG ... (from pranay, Sept 2012) Aussie Rules is the most popular by an absolute mile, then cricket. Rugby league is a small niche sport only popular in the lower socio economic areas of Sydney, Newcastle and Brisbane. Nation wide soccer, basketball, tennis, golf, motor sports, horse racing are all far more popular than either rugby code.

(from Adam, Sept 2012) No offence I don't think its australia rules football it's NRL (from Ash, Sept 2012) I think australia is best in cricket,hockey (from Mayank jain, Aug 2012) in austrilia there is no dout cricket is the number 1 sports according through tv viewer and media (from haroon, July 2012) nrl (national rugby league) is the best sport its physical you need speed and agility and all you need is a ball that is for winter for summer if its to hot for footy play cricket as it is easy and fun and all you need is a bat a bal people and a bin so cricket and NRL for the win!!!!!!!! (from ustralia, July 2012) I think cricket is most popular sport in Australia ... (from Ehsaan shah, June 2012) Australia have been proved them as one of great sporting nation in the world. but they are best in cricket (from Himadri@india, April 2012) Cricket is the best in Australia i think already they have got 4 world cup.

it is amazing (from martyn, March 2012) How about dancing? (from Taffie, Dec 2011) Is that a "SPORT"? The art is always on top of sport (from Philip, Jan 2013) follow Topend Sports

Question: What's the most popular sport in India?
Answer: Cricket