By Ross Kelly
On the eve of the National Football League’s first-ever regular season game in Dublin, Ireland, the league announced it will venture into yet another new market in the 2026 NFL season. Next year, the NFL will hold a regular-season game in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, for the first time, following the success of a pair of games in the South American country’s most populous city, São Paulo.
The league has stated it will hold a minimum of three regular-season games in Rio de Janeiro over five seasons, starting in 2026. The contests will be held at Journalist Mário Filho Stadium, better known as Maracanã Stadium, which has a capacity of nearly 79,000 and is primarily used for soccer matches.
“Building on the success of the games in São Paulo, we could not be more excited to play in one of the world’s most iconic cities—Rio de Janeiro,” said NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell. “We look forward to working closely with our city and state partners in Rio, along with the historic Maracanã Stadium, to deepen our ties to the tens of millions of fans in Brazil and across South America.”
It was just in Week 1 that the NFL held a Brazil game in São Paulo with the Chargers defeating the Chiefs, a year after the Eagles beat the Packers in the same city in Week 1 of the 2024 NFL season.
While Rio getting the country’s next few games doesn’t officially rule out São Paulo from hosting again, there are no future games pending in the latter.
Perhaps the venue size has something to do with the NFL relocating games from São Paulo to Rio. The Arena Corinthians in São Paulo holds just under 48,000 for American football games, so the league could see over 30,000 more fans attend the games in Rio.
Rio’s mayor, Eduardo Paes, highlighted the prestigious nature of Maracanã Stadium in a statement about the city welcoming the NFL.
“The National Football League’s multiyear partnership with Rio, a vibrant city where people want to be, is a perfect match,” said Paes. “It will be a historic event, as NFL games will be included on our city’s official calendar. I’m looking forward to seeing an American football game at Maracanã, the most iconic temple of world football.”
Maracanã Stadium is home to a pair of top-division soccer clubs in Fluminense and Flamengo. It also hosts select matches for the Brazilian National Soccer Team. It has hosted such events as the 1950 FIFA World Cup, the 2014 FIFA World Cup, and the 2016 Summer Olympics. It also saw over 173,000 fans attend a Brazil vs. Uruguay soccer match at the 1950 World Cup, which remains the all-time record for spectators at a soccer match.
Cairo Santos, a kicker for the Chicago Bears, is the only Brazilian-born athlete to ever play in the NFL, but American football has a large footprint in the country. Brazil had one of the largest international audiences for Super Bowl LVII between the Chiefs and Eagles, with the NFL reporting that 2.5 million Brazilians watched the game. That included an average audience of 500,000, which was up 19 percent year-over-year.
Outside of games played in Brazil, the NFL makes concerted efforts to grow American football’s popularity in the country. The league holds programs and initiatives, including flag football events, to engage with the Brazilian locals.
Rio de Janeiro becomes the second international market announced as a host for an NFL game in 2026, joining Melbourne, Australia. Like Rio, Melbourne will also host a game for the first time, and the Los Angeles Rams have already been selected as the designated home team for the 2026 NFL Melbourne Game. Their opponent has not yet been announced, but the contest will take place at the legendary Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Teams and dates have also not been announced for the 2026 NFL Rio de Janeiro Game. However, if the NFL follows suit with what it did for the São Paulo games, then it would take place on the Friday of Week 1 to give teams extra time afterwards for travel.
As for the upcoming NFL game in Dublin, it takes place on Sunday, with the Pittsburgh Steelers meeting the Minnesota Vikings. It is the second of seven international games in the 2026 NFL season, and we’ve reached that part of the schedule where these games will be happening almost weekly.
After Week 4’s Dublin Game, the league will then hold games in London in Weeks 5, 6, and 7. After a two-week break, the NFL will then head to Berlin in Week 10, as the German capital hosts its first regular-season contest. The international slate will then conclude in Week 11 with the NFL Madrid Game, as the league heads to Spain for the first time in history.
