Research finds sports bundles shape telco loyalty and churn

Sports streaming bundles could prompt 43% of Americans to switch mobile, broadband or TV providers, according to new research from subscription bundling platform Bango.

The findings, released July 8, also found that 52% of Americans would trust their current provider more than any other company to combine the live sports they care about into a single bundle.

Bango said fragmentation across sports rights and streaming services has made telco providers a potential consolidation point for consumers.

The company cited the 2026 World Cup in the U.S., where English-language coverage is split across Fox, FS1, Fox One and Tubi, while Spanish-language coverage runs on Telemundo and streams on Peacock.

The survey found that 45% of Americans would choose a provider with a strong sports streaming bundle over one with a lower monthly price. Forty-two percent said they would pay more to their current provider if it included the sports they care about.

Sports bundles also could affect retention and recommendations. Bango said 46% of Americans said a sports streaming bundle would make them more loyal to their current provider, while 49% said it would make them more likely to recommend that provider.

The research also found that 48% of Americans would consider switching to a competitor if their provider removed access to sports.

“Just like on the field, telcos can win or lose with sport, and the numbers make that impossible to ignore. More than four in ten Americans would switch telco for a better sports bundle, and almost as many would walk if their provider lost access to the sports they love. Connectivity alone has never held that kind of power over customer choice,” Giles Tongue, subscription expert at Bango, said.

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“This is the clearest commercial signal telcos will get. Sports rights are scattered across a dozen platforms, and consumers are looking to their provider to pull them back together. They’ll pay more, stay longer, and recommend whoever does it first. In this fight, bundling is the weapon. The telcos that move fast to bundle sports will win the customer, but the ones that hesitate will spend the next decade defending against churn,” Tongue said.