Twitch’s core audience are young and passionate about many things. Although Twitch was largely a videogame live-streaming platform in the past, this is no longer entirely true. All kinds of streamers and genres are accepted on the purple platform, including real-life sports, such as the world’s favourite: football. By analysing data from Twitch Chats across the global platform, Streams Charts is providing a unique insight into the world’s most passionate online football fans.
Twitch Chats provide a screenshot of our culture. The data from these chatrooms reflects the most-discussed football clubs, coaches, and footballers around the globe; although this popularity can stem from both good and bad press. Having combed through Twitch Chat activity since August, the data collected reflects the favourites of football of the 23/24 UEFA Champions League, as well as Europe’s most popular leagues.
Leading the way with over 1M total Mentions, FC Barcelona is the world’s most popular football club on Twitch. Although the ever-popular club was hopeful for a strong placement at the Champions League, they exited the quarterfinals after losing to Paris Saint-Germain. The spanish-speaking sector of Twitch is particularly strong, and their passion for football shone through in their support of Barcelona. Although Real Madrid was less popular than Barcelona, it reached a higher peak. The Madrid-based club was mentioned 36.6K times in a single day when they defeated Manchester City in the Champions League quarterfinals through a penalty shootout.
Despite Barcelona’s success, Milan and Madrid are football’s most popular cities. Madrid brought two clubs to the top 10, and collected a total 1.1M Mentions. Even more impressively, Milan managed to reach 1.56M Mentions, thanks to Inter Milan, AC Milan, and another surprise club.
Paris Saint-Germain fell just short of seven figures, reaching 998.9K Mentions. The French club continues its regional domination, but after a loss against Borussia Dortmund in the semifinals, they will have to experience this year’s Champions League Final from home. PSG’s popularity was also significantly boosted by one of their star players, which we will look at later.
Inter Milan took the third spot with 840K Mentions, but this statistics is inflated due to sharing their name partially with Inter Miami CF. The Italian club has not looked kindly upon the Floridian club taking up the name, but it boosted their mentions above their home rivals AC Milan. Inter Milan was most discussed on March 13, the date of their loss to Atlético Madrid in the Champions League knockouts.
Borussia Dortmund led the way for Germany with 470.3K Mentions, but Bayer 04 Leverkusen was a strong competitor at 296.7K Mentions. The club’s signing of Xabi Alonso has turned the team around, and winning the 23/24 Bundesliga season ended Bayern Munich’s run of 11 successive championships: a hot topic among German football fans.
While many of these football clubs have hundreds of years of history, a legacy for their fans, and major international support, sometimes the players are the key. For some teams, individual players are more popular than the clubs themselves.
Unsurprisingly, record-breaking eight-time-Ballon d'Or winner Lionel Messi is football’s most popular player. Messi was mentioned 2.93M times across Twitch, making him more popular than football’s biggest clubs. The football player was surely a source of popularity for the “Inter” term for clubs, and unlike other players on this ranking, his popularity is ever-lasting. While other players enjoyed specific peaks in mentions thanks to news stories or strong performances, Messi garnered a stable and high amount of mentions throughout our data.
Kylian Mbappe of PSG also eclipsed his club; the French footballer was mentioned 1.475M times, cementing him as footballs second-most-popular player for the time being. He was also the most-mentioned footballer in a single day, receiving 22.8K mentions on May 10 and 22K mentions on May 11. The footballer took to social media to officially announce his departure from PSG: a dark day for any French football fan.
Of course, Cristiano Ronaldo and Harry Kane remain as popular as ever, and Haaland has become a household name since joining Manchester City. Interestingly, although Barcelona was the world’s most popular football club, they could not even place a player within this top 10 ranking. Mohamed Salah of Liverpool FC also outperformed his club strongly, as well as Bukayo Saka of Arsenal FC.
Looking towards coaches, the dynamics graphic shows a much more volatile set of affairs. The world’s most popular coaches were far more prone to consistent bursts of popularity and discussion, compared to the players themselves.
Xavier Hernández Creus, or simply Xavi, has been footballs’ most discussed coach throughout the season, with a monstrous 3.91M mentions in Twitch Chats. Not all of this discussion has been positive, he reached a peak of 49K mentions on May 4, when Barcelona lost 4-2 against Girona. Unfortunately for the Spanish coach, rumours are circulating the football industry that the Spanish manager is potentially facing finding a new position.
Another Spanish coach, Xabi Alonso of Bayer Leverkusen was mentioned 335.1K times, far outperforming his club in terms of comparative popularity. The attraction of the Bundesliga is that feeling that anyone can turn a club around, and Xabi has managed this since joining in late 2022. In the club’s first season with the Spanish manager, he immediately fielded a competitive team, especially considering the club was facing relegation only a couple of years ago. The fairy-tale story has brought massive excitement to both German and Spanish football fans, rocketing him to the top of this list.
Although Xabi Alonso was popular, Massimiliano Allegri reached a much higher peak. The Italian manager has been a topic of debate for many football fans, with many unpleased with his heated reactions and flares of anger. Allegri’s displeasure brought discussions to 4.9K mentions on April 30, but at the Coppa Italia final on May 15, things boiled over for the manager. He exploded at a referee, and ultimately, the club has made the decision to fire him because of the incident, deeming him “ incompatible with the values of Juventus”.
Nissaxter of Spain was the most active football chat on Twitch, with Spanish fans generating over 3.07M mentions since August 2023. The Spanish streamer is most well-known for her League of Legends content, although her chat seems to be alive with fans. Lacobraaa of Argentina was also highly popular, with 469.6K Mentions recorded. The Spanish-speaking community on Twitch in general is extremely passionate, not only isolated to the Iberian peninsula: this is something we will explore below in the geographic and language data for all mentions.
Excluding the Spanish-speaking side of Twitch, castro_1021 was the most popular English-speaking creator on this list. The Mexican-American streamer hosts watch parties for major matches, and generally bases his content heavily on football sports culture. He also plays a lot of EA Sports FC 24 on stream, which helps boost the football mentions from his chat. With such a young demographic, Twitch is the ideal place for new-wave of football personalities to join the industry.
As expected, Spain is by far the most crucial country for football in the world. The country generated 5.8M mentions, or 22.5% of the total global football discussion on Twitch. The country is hugely popular, and this only compounds once other Spanish-speaking countries like Argentina are considered. With the combined force of the Spanish-speaking world, Spanish-language broadcasts on Twitch represent 40.7% of the total football discussion on the platform.
The United States of America is also surprisingly popular, generating 1.95M mentions for our statistics. Much more powerful than other European countries, the United States likely enjoyed a boost thanks to its raw population size and the upcoming 2026 World Cup, which counteracts the fact that football is not as popular as other sports in the country. English-speaking broadcasts also accounted for 20.1% of all mentions, including both streamers from the United Kingdom, other English-speaking countries, and general international streamers broadcasting in the lingua franca.
Italy and Germany were both relatively similar in terms of influence, although Italy slightly edged out Germany in terms of both geographical location and language statistics. Behind these two followed France and the UK. Brazil was the second-most-critical Latin American country, and the combined force of Brazil and Portugal pushed Portuguese-language broadcasts ahead of French ones.
