The WNBA set an attendance record. What new heights can the league reach?

The latest season of the WNBA set a new attendance record and experts say the rise of star players, new teams and a wave of interest in women's sports more broadly are fuelling the league's growing popularity.

Some 3.79 million fans attended WNBA games in 2026, according to a Sports Business Journal analysis this week. That's a 20 per cent increase from the previous year, driven by the 25 games that were relocated to larger arenas to meet higher demand.

Average capacity was at 90 per cent or higher for eight of the league's 15 teams over the past season, the analysis also showed. Overall, the league average was 83 per cent.

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"If you look at the numbers, nobody's really surprised," said Cheri Bradish, an associate professor and director of the Future of Sport Lab at Toronto Metropolitan University.

"We know that the WNBA has [more than] 25 years behind it, and so the growth of the league is very much following the hockey-stick curve that folks expected."

Ann Pegoraro, the Lang chair in sport management at the University of Guelph, says a "pivotal moment" in the league's ascent was the 2020 season, when the WNBA — like the NBA — played without crowds in a COVID-19 pandemic isolation zone called the "Wubble."

"People were in their homes and had a chance to watch, and they saw how good the women's game is," Pegoraro told CBC News.

Around the same time, women's college basketball surged in popularity, propelled by stars such as Caitlin Clark, who brought a huge following with her to the WNBA.

That has translated into greater sponsorship revenue, expansion teams and now attendance records,