The 2026 FIFA World Cup is just around the corner and this edition will be the biggest one so far, thanks to its format expansion to 48 national teams. But despite the many controversies surrounding this event, it’s expected to capture the global attention once it starts on June 11th.

And Venezuela won’t be an exception. As the Vinotinto fell short on its goal to reach its first-ever World Cup, the consolation for football fans and casual viewers would be seeing the games live.

But that comes with several caveats.

If someone wants to see all the 104 games of the tournament, DirecTV Sports has the exclusive rights for several South American countries, including us. That means either paying for it as part of a premium cable/satellite TV plan and/or an Internet provider that includes its own platform, DirecTVGO. 

For example there’s Inter, one of the largest companies which offers the separate option of DirecTV at 7 $, additional to any of their three main plans (lowest at 33 $ and highest at 60 $). Meanwhile, SimpleTV (previously known as DirecTV Venezuela until 2020), offers DSports as part of its three more expensive satellite TV plans which can go from around 14 $ to 35 $.

In late April, Disney+ (through ESPN) announced that they would show 30 matches, including 22 group stage games and eight knockout matches (including both semi-finals and the final). That option is only for its Premium Plan subscribers, while also providing them extra coverage.

Fortunately, there’ll be a free-to-air option as well: Private TV channel Televen will offer a smaller batch of games and by its calendar, only a third of the 72 group stage matches will be available. Also, they won’t show most of the early knockout stages (Rounds of 32 and 16) and only two of the quarter-finals but both semi-finals and the final on July 19th are included.

This is not exclusive to Venezuela: many countries have witnessed how recent editions of the FIFA World Cup have become less accessible unless you can afford to pay for the whole thing.

Looking at its selection of first-round games, top contenders like Spain, France or the defending champions Argentina are favored… but just two out of their three group matches. Same thing with England and Germany, while only one game for Brazil and the Netherlands. If you are rooting for Portugal or Colombia, lucky for you as you can see both teams playing each other.

As for the three host nations, the US and Mexico will have two games shown (including their openers) but Canada gets only one (its closer against Switzerland). And in the case you wanna see games like Türkiye vs. Australia, Haiti vs. Scotland or Panama vs. Ghana among others, the only options are DirecTV or to do just as some people like to call “sailing the high seas.”

Of course, this is not exclusive to Venezuela: many countries have witnessed how recent editions of the FIFA World Cup have become less accessible unless you can afford to pay for the whole thing. Take for example Spain, where only a few matches (including those of La Roja) will be shown openly in TVE while most are exclusive for streamer DAZN. Even in co-host Mexico, there’ll be just one daily game in free-to-air TV, while most are streaming-exclusive.

From airwaves to fibre

There’s a lot said about how FIFA is milking the World Cup dry, including in how its broadcasting rights are sold. Until a few days ago, there was the fear that the two most populous nations on Earth (India and the People’s Republic of China) would be completely shut out of seeing the World Cup at all (at least legally). It took last-minute deals to avoid such a huge embarrassment.

But as with competitions like the Olympics, the Premier League or the NFL, the trend of streaming services buying out those rights and forcing people to either subscribe or simply not watch them has been on the rise. The failed experiment of the 1992 Olympics Triplecast was an early predecessor of the way things have become now thanks to the huge leaps in technology. 

In contrast, coverage of the World Cup in Venezuela has been mostly on traditional television. Back in 1970, Radio Caracas Television (RCTV) became the first station to broadcast the World Cup live by announcing it with a full-page ad in newspaper El Nacional days before the opening match.

Four years later, main rival Venevisión had the exclusive rights for the event held in Germany.

Since 1978, the two channels started to compete against each other in and both spared no expense in their coverage, continuing during the 80s and 90s. “At the time, RCTV had an advantage in certain areas like its colorful commentary (from late commentator Lazaro Candal)”, says sport journalist Antonio Matheus.

But in 2002, a couple of major changes occured. First up, Meridiano TV (a local sports TV channel related to the sports newspaper of the same name) got the free-TV broadcasting rights instead of RCTV for the edition co-hosted by Japan and South Korea, along with Venevisión.

The second was satellite TV entering the scene. DirecTV then bought the rights for that edition and the next one for some Latin American countries, with the intention of sub-licence them to local stations but limiting the number of matches they could show, like the opener and the final.

Matheus remembered that he convinced his parents to subscribe to the service because of this and thinks there has been a possible fragmentation in how Venezuelans see el Mundial on TV ever since.

After RCTV’s shutdown in 2007, Meridiano, VV and Televen took over for South Africa 2010 and Brazil 2014. But the decline of the local media sector and the economic downturn reached a point when the World Cup was in danger of not being shown in Venezuela: Empresas Polar bought the Russia 2018 TV rights and gave them to both Venevision and Meridiano TV as a “gesture”. Televen later became the only free-to-air channel with the WC rights for Qatar 2022.

This leads to the other major shift in the way sports events are experienced: being streamed from the internet into not only our TV screens but into our laptops, tablets and mobile smartphones. That comes with its own share of technical and logistical challenges.

When global content meets local capacities

“The thing about streaming is that it is tantamount to risk. It’s very common, especially in live sports events, that people will notice transmission failures…”, says Matheus, who also adds: “The thing about live TV is that it is never really live, the signal goes from the camera to the satellite then it goes into receivers and some time is lost. In streaming, the time lost is longer.”

For one, the improvement of Venezuela’s Internet quality is good news but given the limited legal options, the use of VPN and/or unlicensed options could hinder viewers’ experience.

It’s impossible to say how many will use online piracy to see the World Cup, but there’s an example of how limiting choices could force some to look into it. In the UK, the UEFA Champions League Final (where one of the clubs was London’s Arsenal) was not shown for free for the first time, as rights holder TNT Sports made it only available for pay-TV and on streaming service HBOMax. In the end, the UCL final had 7 million legal viewers but also a large amount of illegal streams.

In Venezuela, according to Matheus, “some restaurants use Magis or Flujo TV (two well-known illegal streaming apps) which have access to all matches but with the risk that the quality is at best defective.”

And the other is the elephant in the room: the ongoing electricity crisis affecting most of the country with almost daily blackouts of several hours, which are even worse in some regions.

One consequence of this is people having to spend some of their limited income in order to adapt their living routines to the current situation, according to a TalCual report. Between buying rechargeable lightbulbs and fans, fuel for power plants or repairing damaged electric appliances, the reality for some is that the World Cup is not a priority.

Matheus considers that those still interested in at least some of the games will plan and go instead for watching in public settings like restaurants or clubs which have electric plants.

Yet, there are signs of mundial fever in the streets of cities like Barquisimeto and Maracaibo: some businesses have put thematic decoration, while jerseys of the most well-known teams are being sold by stores and street vendors. Even some kids have joined their fathers’ tradition of collecting the official sticker album by Panini, about to end its relationship with FIFA after 2030.

Matheus concludes that “despite distrust in FIFA, football is so beautiful, so universal and so relevant that it lifts so much passion and joy… you see the World Cup because it’s a fantastic tournament.”