The NFL will continue its social media efforts on Reddit amid a new deal.
According to a report by Jacob Feldman in Sportico, the NFL has extended its content agreement with social media platform Reddit through the 2026-27 season, meaning the league will continue to post content to the platform from its official account. Of course, the NFL’s deal with Reddit is unique to that of other social media platforms because, unlike other platforms, the NFL is simply another user among a much larger community.
“Reddit head of content partnerships Sarah Rosen said, the league’s posts are functionally treated like any other user’s posts. The league doesn’t control r/NFL, and its social media managers have met with the page’s longtime moderators to ensure smooth cooperation,” Feldman reports.
Reddit has continued to grow as a hub for conversation about sports. Per Feldman, the NFL subreddit has “nearly 10x’d in subscribers” since the NFL formally initiated its relationship with Reddit in 2019.
Perhaps the most crucial element of the NFL’s presence on the platform is the league’s use of highlights. Whereas third parties would typically need to license highlight rights for use on their platforms, the NFL regularly posts the most engagement-worthy clips to Reddit itself, largely bypassing the need for other users to rip clips via other means, and further helping generate discussion about the league.
“There’s a whole lot of NFL conversation happening … with a large group of our most avid fans,” NFL VP, media strategy and business development Brent Lawton told Sportico. “So we felt like we should try and figure out how we can get there and make that conversation more authentic and be a part of it.”
For the NFL, the benefit extends well past fans engaging with more of its content. The league shares ad revenue generated from the content it posts on the platform, similar to its agreements with other social media sites. And the league’s active participation on Reddit is paying off. Through the first three weeks of the season, NFL content saw a 223% increase on the platform year-over-year.
No doubt, these types of relationships between leagues and social media platforms will only grow more important as digitally-native fans become the core consumers for live sports.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.