Anh Đức

Calling it a decision with “deep social meaning” that goes beyond economics, Vietnam Television (VTV) has secured the broadcasting rights to the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

The move signals that watching football’s premier tournament is not just a privilege, but something intended to remain accessible to everyone.

To appreciate the weight of that statement, it helps to look back. Before 1975, World Cup coverage in Việt Nam was sporadic. In 1974, viewers could only watch the final.

It was not until 1982 that Vietnamese fans followed an entire World Cup, still on black-and-white screens, through relayed signals from foreign broadcasters, such as the Soviet Union's television.

Through the 1980s and early 1990s, broadcasting rights were almost an alien concept; the World Cup simply arrived like a gift passed along by goodwill.

That began to change in 1994 and 1998, when FIFA offered Việt Nam symbolic fees or advertising exchanges under its developing-market policy. Then came 2002, when VTV paid US$1 million, the country's first genuine commercial transaction for a World Cup. It has been a steep climb ever since.

A domestic competitor outbid VTV in 2006 at $2 million. VTV paid $2.7 million in 2010, then $7 million in 2014, negotiated down from an initial $14 million.

By 2018, the figure hit $12 million, with a substantial chunk covered by corporate sponsorship that got the deal over the line weeks before kick-off. For 2022, the price reached roughly $15 million, secured only three weeks before the tournament began.

This time, the pressure is even greater. The 2026 World Cup, co-hosted by the US, Canada and Mexico, is the largest in history, featuring 48 teams and 104 matches.

VTV has not disclosed the figure, but industry observers expect it to eclipse the 2022 record. FIFA's official confirmation came on April 3, and VTV held back its own announcement until April 13, giving a sense of how delicate the negotiations were.

What VTV has secured, however, is comprehensive. The broadcaster now holds every form of media right within Vietnamese territory: terrestrial, cable, satellite, IPTV, radio, mobile, internet, social media and, crucially, public screening rights.

That last category matters: fan zones, restaurant screenings and cinema viewings — the communal rituals that turn a tournament into a national event — can now be legally licensed.

And yet the deeper question is not what VTV paid, but why it matters that it paid at all. Vietnamese fans have increasingly turned to pirate streams, a habit I have written about before.

Every World Cup that slips behind paywalls or gets bought at the last minute risks pushing more viewers towards illegal platforms, which come with their own hidden costs, such as gambling advertisements, data harvesting and the normalisation of copyright violation.

VTV's decision to pay a premium to keep the 2026 tournament on free-to-air television, and to distribute it across every platform legally, is both a cultural statement and a practical one.

It says that in Việt Nam, a World Cup should still feel like a gift — not to the broadcasters, but to the people who will gather around screens from Hà Nội to Hồ Chí Minh City to cheer for teams thousands of miles away.

The price may rise every four years. But if the principle holds — that the World Cup belongs to everyone — then the cost is more than justified. - VNS