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College football market tiers

Which of the 68 Power 4 and Notre Dame programs have national reach, and which play in small markets? We sorted every program into four tiers by TV audience, football revenue, home attendance and the size of its home TV market.

National · Big market · Medium market · Small market · How the tiers work ↓ · Program rankings

Columns after the market score are percentiles among the 68 schools (100 = highest; for Metro, the biggest TV market).

National (ranks 1–14, 14 schools)

#	School	Market score	TV	Revenue	Attendance	Metro
1	Georgia	93.4	98	94	88	89
2	Michigan	92.9	92	97	100	78
3	Texas	90.3	95	100	94	56
4	Ohio State	89.1	98	91	97	54
5	Alabama	87.9	99	93	90	50
6	Tennessee	85.8	93	96	93	41
7	LSU	77.5	89	82	91	24
8	Texas A&M	76.6	83	79	96	30
9	Oklahoma	73.7	67	90	82	46
10	Notre Dame	72.7	70	98	78	21
11	Penn State	71.8	66	88	98	16
12	Washington	70.7	55	84	72	79
13	Florida	70.0	83	76	87	4
14	Auburn	69.2	71	85	85	12

Big market (ranks 15–24, 10 schools)

#	School	Market score	TV	Revenue	Attendance	Metro
15	USC	64.4	54	56	71	98
16	Miami	64.0	62	69	54	72
17	Florida State	63.2	71	74	68	19
18	Ole Miss	62.6	67	65	66	43
19	Nebraska	62.3	48	87	84	18
20	Clemson	62.2	51	68	81	53
21	South Carolina	61.1	66	57	79	34
22	Oregon	60.6	69	78	56	13
23	Wisconsin	58.7	41	81	76	32
24	Iowa	58.3	50	75	74	25

Medium market (ranks 25–55, 31 schools)

#	School	Market score	TV	Revenue	Attendance	Metro
25	Arkansas	54.9	44	71	75	22
26	Utah	54.8	47	66	47	60
27	Minnesota	52.4	38	72	31	75
28	Colorado	52.3	59	40	44	74
29	TCU	50.8	43	54	28	93
30	Michigan State	49.6	42	63	69	15
31	NC State	48.0	33	53	52	69
32	Virginia Tech	47.3	31	60	65	35
33	North Carolina	47.3	44	48	35	69
34	Rutgers	46.2	33	43	34	100
35	Missouri	45.6	66	29	62	9
36	Georgia Tech	45.5	43	44	19	89
37	Kentucky	45.1	60	21	59	40
38	UCLA	44.5	42	32	26	98
39	Northwestern	43.3	29	62	2	96
40	BYU	42.8	37	28	63	60
41	Maryland	42.7	40	41	16	87
42	Indiana	42.0	35	46	32	65
43	Duke	42.0	48	47	3	69
44	Illinois	41.7	29	59	50	26
45	Oklahoma State	41.4	45	38	37	46
46	Iowa State	41.3	38	35	60	37
47	Pittsburgh	40.9	38	34	41	62
48	Arizona State	39.7	34	26	38	81
49	Texas Tech	39.2	36	50	53	7
50	Vanderbilt	37.6	60	18	6	66
51	Purdue	37.3	29	52	57	2
52	Boston College	36.8	40	24	18	82
53	Louisville	36.4	46	19	40	44
54	California	35.8	32	31	13	85
55	West Virginia	35.7	39	10	48	62

Small market (ranks 56–68, 13 schools)

#	School	Market score	TV	Revenue	Attendance	Metro
56	Kansas	31.0	40	15	21	57
57	Stanford	30.6	41	9	4	85
58	Syracuse	30.1	34	37	15	28
59	Mississippi State	30.0	45	12	46	10
60	Arizona	29.0	36	16	29	38
61	SMU	27.8	29	7	7	93
62	UCF	27.6	29	4	24	76
63	Baylor	26.9	32	22	22	30
64	Houston	26.3	29	2	10	91
65	Kansas State	25.9	36	13	43	6
66	Virginia	23.0	29	25	25	3
67	Cincinnati	21.1	29	3	12	52
68	Wake Forest	20.9	29	6	9	48

How the tiers work

Each of four measures is turned into a percentile among the 68 schools (0 to 100, ties averaged). The market score is the weighted average. Tier lines are drawn at natural breaks, the largest score gaps between neighboring schools: after #14, #24 and #55. The six schools at the top are separated from #7 by the widest gap of all (8.3 points).

TV viewership (35%): average viewers per Nielsen-rated game, 2023–2025, each season scored separately. 2023: Action Network compilation of Nielsen data; 2024: Nielsen top 10; 2025: Nielsen top 20 as published by On3 (top 10 also via Texas Athletics).
Football revenue (30%): average football revenue FY2023–FY2025 reported to the U.S. Dept. of Education (EADA).
Home attendance (20%): average home attendance 2023–2025. 2023 from CollegeFootballData.com game records; 2024–2025 from D1.ticker.
Home metro (15%): Nielsen 2025-26 TV market (DMA) rank of the campus's county, as listed by Methodshop; county assignments checked against USTVDB county lists.

Caveats

Viewership coverage is incomplete. Public per-team averages exist for 59 of the 68 schools in 2023, only the top 10 in 2024 and the top 20 in 2025. A school not on a season's list is tied at the bottom for that season. That is an assumption that it fell below the list's cutoff, not a measured number.
Unmeasured networks. Nielsen-rated averages leave out games on networks that don't buy Nielsen measurement, such as SEC Network, ACC Network, CBS Sports Network, ESPN+ and Peacock. Those are usually a school's least-watched games, so SEC and ACC averages run high compared with Big Ten schools, whose Big Ten Network games are measured.
Attendance sources. Downloadable NCAA team-level reports weren't available for 2024–25, so a secondary compilation is used, and 2023 comes from a different source. Figures are announced attendance, not tickets scanned. Northwestern's 2024–25 numbers reflect its temporary lakefront stadium.
TV market mapping. Markets are assigned by the campus's county. West Virginia (Morgantown) is in the Pittsburgh market, per a county filing with the FCC. Campus market size understates statewide and national fan bases, which is why it carries the least weight.
Football revenue at some schools includes university transfers, so heavily subsidized programs can look somewhat bigger than their market.
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