Sports Sponsorship & Marketing Trends 2025: 10 Key Insights

The past 12 months have seen AI become the focus of technology sponsorships, venue naming rights offered as Olympic inventory for the first time and life-sized cars made of Lego driven down a Formula One track.

However, there were plenty of other memorable activations, partnerships and developments in sports sponsorship and marketing in 2025. As the year draws to a close, SportsPro picks out ten of the major trends and storylines from the sector.

1. The AI partner designation is hot property – but sports are splitting up the category

Technology partnerships in sport are nothing new, but this year saw an increasing number of rights holders begin to integrate AI into their sponsorships.

The Premier LeagueNFL, ATP and multiple F1 teams are all among those who have signed AI-flavoured deals over the past 12 months, and some appear to be splitting up the rights to the category in ways that enable them to maximise the opportunity from both a revenue and technology standpoint.

For example, the NFL’s AI partnership with Adobe is focused on fan-facing activations, while Microsoft’s expanded deal with the American football league is more geared towards sideline evaluation and workflows, player scouting and streamlining stadium operations.

With so many potential applications of AI, it seems rights holders are leaving themselves enough wriggle room to make the most of them all.

2. F1 is setting the bar in sports sponsorship

Earlier this year, I asked whether any rights holder could match Formula One’s commercial growth after the series reported around US$634m in sponsorship revenue for 2024, more than double the US$273m they were making in 2017.

It isn’t just the revenue growth that’s been impressive, but also the diversification of its portfolio to include more consumer brands. This year alone saw the series add PepsiCo and several LVMH brands to its partnership roster, and so popular has it become that companies were even clamouring to sponsor the fictional APX GP team in Apple’s F1 movie.

The series also delivered what was arguably the most memorable sports marketing moment of 2025when drivers swapped real cars for life-size replicas made by Formula One licensee Lego during the pre-race festivities in Miami.

3. Even the most traditional organisations are compromising

The IOC’s clean venue policy has long kept Olympics arenas free from advertising, but Paris 2024 offered the first signs that the organisation is open to giving more visibility to its partners.

That is set to go even further at LA28 following the unprecedented move to allow brands to buy naming rights to official competition venues for the first time. Comcast, Honda and Intuit are among those that have already taken up the opportunitywhich is a clear indication that even the most traditional rights holders are having to be flexible to unlock more value for their sponsors.

It has also provided a new revenue stream for LA28, which after a busy year of deal activity has passed the US$2bn mark in domestic sponsorship revenue.

The Democratic Republic of Congo’s tourism board struck several sponsorship deals in European soccer as the likes of Arsenal faced calls to end their deal with Visit Rwanda (Image credit: Getty Images)

4. Digital banking, tourism and beauty categories make their move

Sponsorship sales teams are always sniffing around for emerging categories and new entrants, and this year has seen digital banks and fintech companies spend handsomely on sports sponsorship, with Revolut in particular striking some notable deals.

The tourism sector also picked up where it left off in 2024. Both the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Republic of Congo looked to capitalise on the pressure applied to European soccer clubs to end their deals with Visit Rwanda, which itself pushed into the US in September.

Elsewhere, beauty and makeup brands like Sephora (UnrivaledAthletes Unlimited, Golden State Valkyries) and E.l.f. Cosmetics (NWSL, Tottenham HotspurBillie Jean King Cup) continue to be some of the most prominent sponsors in women’s sports.

Chinese appliances brand Haiercrypto exchange Bitpanda and tech giant Google (as well as many of its devices and technology brands) were also among those that accumulated a high volume of deals this year, according to SportsPro’s sponsorship tracker.

5. You don’t have to be the best to be a marketable athlete

Historically, titles translated to brand deals if you were an athlete. But this year, not even Rory McIlroy’s Grand Slam-clinching win at the Masters could earn him a place in the 2025 list of the world’s 50 most marketable athletes.

While sporting success is still important, the 2025 edition of 50MM served as a reminder that cultural relevance is fuelling a new era of athlete marketability where sports stars are no longer defined simply by their performance, but also their interests, hobbies, values and causes they stand for.

6. Unbundling is paying off for global governing bodies

This year’s major international events were another opportunity to acknowledge the ongoing progress in women’s sport – and to evaluate the success of unbundling the sponsorship rights to women’s competitions from the men’s.

The verdict is so far, so good. The sponsor portfolio for Women’s Euro 2025 included 15 global partners, four tournament sponsors and five national supporters, as well as three licensees, and Uefa said sponsorship revenue for the event was up 145 per cent compared to 2022.

World Rugby also credited the unbundling process as one of the contributing factors as it trebled sponsorship revenue for this year’s Women’s Rugby World Cup, while the ICC has secured its first standalone women’s tournament deals with Unilever and Google.

7. Changing betting regulations continue to cause headaches for rights holders

The Premier League’s looming front-of-shirt betting sponsor ban isn’t putting off any of the competition’s teams, 11 of which will be in the market for a new partner ahead of the 2026/27 season.

Further afield, though, tighter regulation has forced other rights holders into action. That includes the BCCIwhich secured Apollo Tyres as the Indian national cricket team’s shirt sponsor after Dream11 ended its deal following the country’s ban on real money iGaming.

Elsewhere, one wonders how much longer US leagues will be allowed to continue to deepen their relationships with the betting industry following more sports-related gambling scandals in the country this year.

This year saw Unilever become the first dedicated sponsor of the ICC’s women’s events (Image credit: Getty Images)

8. Are title sponsors an endangered species?

There’s admittedly an element of recency bias to this one following news of the WTA’s new premier partnership with Mercedesbut Marina Storti was the second sports executive this year – after Gawain Davies at Euroleague Basketball – to tell me that the organisation transitioned away from a title sponsorship model partly because it wanted its own brand front and centre.

There are still plenty of examples that point to the contrary, but will this become a theme at the league and tour level as more sports properties rebrand for the digital age?

9. Licensing is the next big opportunity in women’s sports

Sponsorship of women’s sports properties has steadily been on the rise in recent years, but licensing arrangements could be the next thing to take off amid growing demand for products and merchandise featuring female athletes.

Earlier this year, OneTeam’s Ricky Medina told me that the WNBA players association now has 40 licensees spanning product categories like trading cards, jerseys and video games, as well as premium apparel, toys and collectibles. As a result, the union’s commercial revenue grew 450 per cent in 2024.

Since then, we’ve seen Mattel create Barbie dolls of rugby stars Ilona Maher and Ellie Kildunne, Football Manager secure licences to include the WSL and NWSL in its game, and the WNBPA sign a record-breaking extension with Paniniwhich has been described as the most lucrative licensing partnership ever for women athletes.

All of the products that will be circulating as a result will contribute to more visibility for women’s sports and further grow its fanbase.

10. Disruptor leagues are proving their worth

Several disruptor leagues made their debut this year and some returned for a second season, which itself is sometimes viewed as success for a startup competition.

Some of these new leagues are promising to end the industry’s overreliance on media rights income by offering brands direct access to Gen Z audiences. And, to their credit, the likes of Kings League, Baller LeagueTGL and Unrivaled have all built impressive sponsorship portfolios.

That suggests to me not only that they have solid data enabling them to paint a picture of who their fans are, but also that by creating a new product they’ve succeeded in carving out assets and opportunities that might not be available to sponsors in more traditional sports.