NFL and Christmas have been closely linked together for a long time in the US. The American Football regular season ends early in January, with the Super Bowl following in February. Matchweek 17 out of 18 will be played between December 25 and 31, with two games taking place on Christmas Day, Wednesday December 25.
Kansas City Chiefs (Super Bowl winners this year) vs. Pittsburgh Steelers, and Baltimore Ravens vs. Houston Texans. Mariah Carey will perform at the beginning and Beyoncé will perform in the halftime of her home Houston match).
Those two games will be broadcast live worlwide on December 25 through Netflix, with several languages including Spanish, French and German, and it will be included on every subscription tier.
Netflix bets on sport and live events
This "Christmas gift" marks the first time Netflix broadcasts live an NFL match, but won't be the last, as the current contract lasts until 2026.
"Last year, we decided to take a big bet on live — tapping into massive fandoms across comedy, reality TV, sports, and more", said Netflix Chief Content Officer, Bela Bajaria. The most succesful this year was the Mike Tyson vs. Jake Paul boxing bout... so much so, that millions of people had trouble watching it live, promption a class action lawsuit against the streamer giant.
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Hopefully Netflix's servers are stronger on Christmas Day, "typically Netflix biggest day of the year", althought it remains to be seen how many people will watch it outside of the US, and withint the US, how many will choose Netflix: the matches will also be seen on broadcast TV in the competing team cities and on NFL+.
NFL is reaching more and more people worldwide, as seen in the enormous crowds that happened in London and Munich with the NFL European stops in October. Beyoncé will perform
NFL won't stop trying new things to attract new public, including initiatives like turning the live game into a Simpsons episode last week...
What time are the Christmas NFL games on Netflix?
Interested in the games? Then we have good news, as they will happen at very reasonable times in Europe.
Chiefs vs. Steelers starts at 13:00 ET. That's 19:00 CET (Central European Time, one hour less in UK).
Ravens vs. Texans kicks off at 16:30 ET. That's 22:30 CET (Central European Time, one hour less in UK).
If you don't catch them live, the games will remain on Netflix for 24 hours after the livestream ends (only 3 hours in the US).