The Seattle Seahawks were granted international marketing rights in Australia and New Zealand, the league announced at the annual league meetings.

Ari Horton

PALM BEACH, Fla.It was announced Monday at the annual NFL League Meetings that the Seahawks were awarded marketing rights in Australia and New Zealand as a part of the NFL's Global Markets Program.

The Seahawks already have marketing rights in Canada and last season were awarded rights in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

The NFL is focused on the growth of the league worldwide and the addition of more markets for teams is part of that plan. Peter O'Reilly, NFL Executive Vice President, Club Business, International & League Events said, "We're focused on global growth overall. We're focused, we're building, we've got a challenger mindset."

Adding, the goal in these markets is about being "year-round on the ground at first, drive fandom, drive cultural relevance and be in these markets for long term with patience and making sure our commitment is clear and we're building fandom that includes participation."

The 2025 regular season games will include seven different games at six different stadiums, reaching five countries and two continents.

"We're focused on continuing to work across the league and the clubs to build momentum in Canada, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand," O'Reilly said.

The first regular season game to be played in Australia will happen in 2026 that will feature the Los Angeles Rams as the designated home team.

When choosing international markets for teams O'Reilly said, "You really look at where the opportunity is, you look at what's the state of the fan base today, where is their interest at."

Adding, "We all know the importance of having a favorite team, that's the heart of the Global Markets Program."

While the Seahawks have no international games as the home team this season, they do play a couple of opponents who have international games the Jacksonville Jaguars who will play in the UK and the Pittsburgh Steelers who will play in Dublin, Ireland. The opponents of those games won't be revealed until schedule release or close to the release of the 2025 NFL schedule.

O'Reilly said, "It's really important to look at all of the factors and get the best possible schedule out then and after the draft."

With the Seahawks being granted the marketing rights to Australia and New Zealand, it gives them a better chance of having an international game there in the future.

"It's not fully defined that if you have those rights, you'll get that game," O'Reilly said. "But clearly our scheduling teams looks to match up those things. [The goal is that] you're activating year-round and then the game is an inflection point A lot of factors go into scheduling but certainly that is one of them where you try to line that up, both as a designated team and in some cases where possible, look at 'is there an opponent that may make sense given their rights there as well."

29 NFL Clubs are now a part of the Global Markets Program across 21 markets, with two new NFL markets of Greece, which was awarded to the Los Angeles Chargers and the UAE which was granted to the Los Angeles Rams, San Francisco 49ers and the Washington Commanders.