New Study: Top 10 Sports Where Resale Tickets Cost Fans the Most

The VIP seats at the World Cup Final went for $1 million on resale sites, according to a July 2026 report. A new study by BettingTop10 reveals the top sports where buying a ticket on the secondary market costs a fortune compared to official sales.

The research compared official ticket prices with resale market rates across 15 elite sports to find where fans end up paying the most above face value. For each sport, one or two major upcoming competitions were selected as benchmarks. The report recorded standard seat prices and VIP package costs from official ticketing channels, then matched them against listings on secondary market platforms. The difference between the two figures (resale minus official) was used to rank each sport from the highest markup to the lowest.

1. Football / Soccer

Getting a World Cup Final ticket on the resale platforms costs fans $5K more than standard rates. The cheapest seats at MetLife start at $10K through official channels, but scalpers push that to $15K on resale sites. The gap gets even bigger for VIP seats: official hospitality packages go for $33K, while the secondhand market asks $1 million. That's a 30x markup on the most exclusive seats in the tournament.

The published ranking is based on standard-seat price gaps, but VIP seats reveal a far more extreme picture. The World Cup Final's VIP resale gap runs to $967,030 (a $32,970 official price against a $1,000,000 resale price), more than 20 times larger than the next biggest VIP gap in the study, McGregor vs Holloway 2's $47,856 (official $79,958 versus resale $127,814). No other sport comes close. If the study had ranked sports by VIP markup instead of standard-seat markup, football's lead over the rest of the field would be even more dominant than it already is.

2. Tennis

Tennis fans also end up paying a premium when purchasing tickets on resale sites. At Wimbledon, standard seats start at $467, but they jump to $9.5K on the secondary market as match dates approach. At the VIP level, Wimbledon's official “debenture seats” go for $22.9K, while on resale they climb to closer to $9K more than that.

Tennis's combined $4.5K premium hides a split result. Wimbledon alone accounts for a $9,094 gap (official seats at $467 against resale at $9,561), but the US Open tells the opposite story: official seats start at $784, while resale seats average just $628, a negative gap of $156. That means a US Open ticket bought on the resale market is typically cheaper than one bought through official channels. Wimbledon's premium is so large it drags the tennis average up to $4.5K despite the US Open pulling in the other direction entirely.

3. MMA

Mixed martial arts comes next on the list. The most anticipated upcoming event in the sport is the “McGregor vs. Holloway 2” fight card in Las Vegas. Standard rates there start at $1.5K, but those who can't get tickets on time have to turn to the resale market, where similar seats sell for more than $2.2K, a $700+ jump. The “Du Plessis vs. Usman” card also carries a resale premium, though a far smaller one.

The MMA category's $402 average gap is driven almost entirely by a single event. McGregor vs Holloway 2 alone posts a $755 gap (seats jumping from $1,517 to $2,272), while Du Plessis vs Usman shows a gap of just $48 (from $123 to $171). That means McGregor vs Holloway 2's premium is more than 15 times larger than the other MMA card in the study. Without that one marquee fight, MMA's position in the top 10 would look very different.

4. Baseball

The standard seats at the MLB All-Star Game officially sell for $238, but on resale sites they go for over $600. That's a 155% markup on face value, meaning fans who buy secondhand pay more than twice the ticket office rate. At the VIP level, scalpers charge baseball supporters even bigger premiums: while official exclusive packages are priced at $17,313, resale listings push those to $28K+.

5. Basketball

Basketball rounds out the top five sports where fans have to pay the biggest premiums for resale tickets. FIBA Women's World Cup tickets in Berlin are selling for $333 on the secondary market, while the official website prices them at $51. VIP seats carry the same extra charge as well, moving from $101 officially to $401 secondhand.

The Only Sport Where Resale Tickets Cost Less

Ice Hockey is the sole sport in the entire 15-sport study with a negative price gap, averaging -$7 across its two benchmark events. That average masks two very different results. NHL Heritage Classic tickets actually get cheaper on resale, dropping from $193 to $140, a $53 discount. NHL Global Series Finland moves the opposite direction, rising from $170 to $209, a $39 premium. It's the Heritage Classic's steep discount that pulls the overall Ice Hockey figure into negative territory, making it the only sport in the study where buying on the secondary market can actually save fans money.

• Standard-seat markups don't tell the full story. The World Cup Final's VIP resale gap ($967,030) dwarfs its standard-seat gap ($5K) by nearly 200x, and is more than 20 times larger than the next biggest VIP gap in the study (MMA's McGregor vs Holloway 2). 
  
  
• High markups are often driven by a single event, not a whole sport. MMA's average gap is almost entirely down to one fight (McGregor vs Holloway 2), which posts a premium over 15 times larger than the other MMA card studied. The same pattern shows up in Tennis.
  
  
• Resale isn't always a markup. Ice Hockey is the only sport in the study where resale tickets are, on average, cheaper than face value.

World Cup tickets have always been expensive, but what's happened to pricing in 2026 is nothing we've seen before. FIFA introduced dynamic pricing for this tournament, which is standard in American sports but completely new for the World Cup. That means prices went up every time demand spiked, but as it could be easily predicted, that demand never stopped spiking. Scalpers then add another layer on top of that, and that's how we ended up in this situation.

- Heather Gartland, Betting Top 10 Analyst

The countdown above covers the top 10, but the underlying study measured 15 elite sports in total. Here's how the remaining five stack up, including the only sport in the study where resale tickets undercut official prices.

Worth noting: Athletics / Track & Field posts the smallest positive gap in the entire study at just $2, official seats average $30 while resale seats average $32, barely different from face value.

Elite sports events were identified and shortlisted based on competitions that are currently taking place or scheduled to occur in the near future. For each selected event, key information was collected, including the competition date and venue, as well as ticket pricing data from both official sales channels and the secondary (resale) market. Pricing was captured separately for standard seating and VIP/premium seating categories to enable a comprehensive market comparison.

For the ranking, the ticket price difference between resale and official prices was calculated using the following formula: Resale minus Official. Sports were then ranked from highest to lowest based on the calculated difference, to identify the sports where resale tickets are significantly more expensive compared to official ticket prices.

You can access the complete research findings here.