The Super Bowl, the biggest event in American football, is set for Sunday with the Seattle Seahawks facing the New England Patriots at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, California.
The massive sporting event is set to energise fans in both cities and will send thousands this year to the San Francisco Bay Area. Those unable to make the trip are still expected to spend heavily on food, drinks and watch parties across the United States.
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Historically, the Super Bowl has been a major economic boon for host cities. For the Bay Area, the event is part of a stretch of three major sporting spectacles lifting the regional economy.
A local boost?
In 2024, the Bay Area Host Committee commissioned a report forecasting the economic impact of the 2025 NBA All-Star Game, the 2026 Super Bowl, and the FIFA World Cup, all taking place in the region. The report estimated that Sunday’s game alone would generate between $370m and $630m in economic output for the Bay Area.
Last year’s Super Bowl was hosted in New Orleans, Louisiana. State officials reported the event brought in 115,000 visitors who spent $658m in the city.
For consumers, Bank of America estimates a 77 percent jump in spending near the stadium. A study analysing spending patterns from Super Bowl games between 2017 and 2025 found that, on game day, spending surged in the postal code closest to the stadium, with the biggest surge in food and parking costs.
Hosting the game does come with its own expenses for cities.
In the case of Santa Clara, it is small compared with the forecasted output. Last year, it was projected the city would cost them $6.3m, which includes training personnel for the influx of visitors and other logistical needs. However, other games have cost municipalities much more. When Atlanta hosted the Super Bowl in 2019, it cost the city an estimated $46m.
In 2023, the day after the game, which was played in Glendale, Arizona, outside of Phoenix, was the single busiest at Phoenix Sky Harbor international airport in its history, with more than 200,000 passengers passing through the airport, which is a hub for American Airlines and where budget carriers Southwest Airlines and Frontier maintain a large presence.
Other cities have used major sporting events to kick off large-scale infrastructure projects. In 2004 – ahead of the Super Bowl in Houston, Texas – METRO, the city’s transit authority, launched its first light rail line just a month before the game. The line, now one of three in the system, runs from downtown Houston to the city’s football stadium.
Prior to its launch, Houston was the only major metropolitan city in the US without a rail system.
But not all infrastructure projects paid off. Las Vegas built Allegiant Stadium in the neighbouring suburb of Paradise when the city acquired the Raiders