EA Discusses College Football at Q1 2026 Earnings Call
During Tuesday's Q1 2026 EA Earnings Call, there were several mentions of EA SPORTS College Football following its launch in early July.
As part of his prepared remarks, EA CEO Andrew Wilson shared that the company is expecting a 'more normal demand curve' for CFB 26 as compared to the hype surrounding the 11-year wait for 25.
Continue on to see all mentions of CFB during the Earnings Call.
Prepared Remarks:
In Q1, our American football ecosystem continued to demonstrate strength with sustained engagement and year-round momentum across Madden NFL and College Football. Building on that foundation, the high-quality launch of College Football 26 marked an exciting next step, earning strong reviews and enthusiastic reception from the community while delivering authenticity, immersion, and innovative gameplay to a passionate community of players.
Following an extraordinary 2025 title reintroduction fueled by a decade of pent-up demand, we expect College Football to settle into a more normal demand curve while establishing its place as a core franchise in our portfolio and across the industry. While it's early, College Football 26 is delivering strong competitive cohort retention. As a result, we are seeing deeper engagement in Ultimate Team versus prior year life-to-date.
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Additionally, our guidance assumes the following. First, last year's launch of EA SPORTS College Football 25 delivered an exceptionally strong quarter that reflected pent-up demand for the fan-favorite franchise. This drove an atypical phasing of net bookings with around 50% of units sold occurring in the first week.
This year, we're approaching the title with a more normalized demand curve, similar to our broader sports titles' historical patterns, leading to a tougher comp for frontline sales. While it's still early, we're encouraged by strong retention, positive player sentiment, and healthy live service performance.
As a result, we expect College Football full game sales to be a headwind in the quarter, partially offset by the growth of Madden NFL 26. Putting it all together, we expect the American football ecosystem to be an 8-point headwind year over year for the quarter, with the ecosystem returning to growth in the second half of the fiscal year.
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Q&A
Eric Sheridan - Goldman Sachs Group Inc - Analyst: Thanks so much for taking the questions. Maybe just two on American football. What has been the consumer receptivity this year to sort of bundling the products together between Madden [NFL and EA], and how that might arc as a theme to go to market over the long term based on what you might be seeing this year?
And then in terms of the global scope for the Madden game, you talked a fair bit about that last year during the NFL season as there was more global attention on the game and there's more games being played overseas this year. How do you think about the potential for Madden to be more of a global franchise over time? Thanks so much.
Andrew Wilson - Electronic Arts Inc - Chairman of the Board, Chief Executive Officer: Yeah, great question. You know what we've been talking about since the launch of College Football last year is that we really truly believe this is
an American football ecosystem. As we look at the sports broadly, the NFL continues to be 90%-plus of the highest-rated broadcasts in this country. College football continues to grow and certainly as it becomes more professional in nature, the expectation is that fandom will continue to grow and the product itself will continue to improve and really take its place alongside the NFL. As we think about our college football product, our NFL product, and all of the things that we do in between those two things, we believe it will act as a multiplier effect.
As a brand, EA SPORTS has had the benefit of nearly 40 years of working symbiotically with sports to both help grow the sport and have the sport help grow our business. And we feel very good about how that will work in the context of NFL and our college property.
One part of that, of course, is the dual purchase of those two products. It was very successful last year. We expect it will continue to be well received by our fan base this year. But as we think medium term to longer term, we have a vision to do significantly more in the context of connecting those two experiences and really harnessing the full power of football fandom.
And again, in the same way we have teased with FC. We've also teased this in the context of American football of this broader social ecosystem where you can come not just to compete, not just to collaborate, but also to celebrate your fandom.
And so as we look over the medium to long term, we believe there's incredible growth opportunity in the American football ecosystem broadly, almost certainly in this country, but also as we see the NFL doing more and more internationally.
Having just returned from Australia and having all of my friends ask me about NFL, I can testify that yes, the fandom around the world is truly growing. In the same way we've seen growth of FC in North America as the sport's grown here. You remember in the last World Cup, North American sales grew 50%. I actually expect that we should start to see, over the course of time, growth in demand around the Madden product in particular and perhaps also the college product internationally.
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Andrew Marok - Raymond James - Analyst: Thank you for taking my question. Maybe in a similar vein to the last question. Now that you've had more than a full cycle to collect the data, how distinct are the player bases between College Football and Madden? And how important is it to kind of keep them as distinct-feeling experiences when someone actually plays the game?
Andrew Wilson - Electronic Arts Inc - Chairman of the Board, Chief Executive Officer: I'd like to say the fan bases are hundreds of millions strong, but what we do know is there's meaningful crossover. But there is real expectation of
differentiation between the two experiences. And if you read any of the feedback that we're getting on the launch of College Football this year, it's being recognized that how we are manifesting the individuality of what College Football is and all the pageantry and what happens across 150 schools and the various playbooks that are used in College Football relative to the NFL. And then what -- the spectacle of what the NFL brings in the context of Madden.
So I think that even as we continue to build experiences that are more deeply connected and offer fans an opportunity to engage deeply in both, we will always maintain the differentiation between what is the core experience, not just on what happens on the field, but the essence of what the sport delivers to fans.
And that will almost always be a little different amongst college and the NFL. But our belief is that in the context of the two games that we make and all of the social features and ecosystem we build around it, that we can both capture that individuality and meet the needs of players across the two franchises.
Andrew Marok - Raymond James - Analyst: Great, thank you. Maybe just a quick follow-up there. We saw some of the reports earlier in the month about a potential return to college basketball. So I guess in the context of your undeniable success with College Football so far, how are you viewing the broader basketball ecosystem as an opportunity, since you haven't had a pro game in a few years? Thank you.
Andrew Wilson - Electronic Arts Inc - Chairman of the Board, Chief Executive Officer: Yeah, great question. We can't say too much about it yet, but if I think about the opportunity, going back to where we are in College Football, college sports are some of the most vibrant fan bases in the world. And that trickles over to basketball.
Certainly, we're seeing momentum of fandom in college basketball also continue to grow. Fans, athletes, universities pour their passion into these sports. And it is that passion that makes them special. It's what makes the games different, for the first part of your question.
But with that comes high expectations and a demand for deeply authentic experiences, capturing the action on the field or the court, representing the energy, pageantry, the traditions, and celebrating unique sights and sounds and stories of every school and rivalry.
We feel like we deliver that incredibly well with College Football. A 140 schools represented the bowls, the playoffs, the trophies. I think the groundbreaking NIL program that we were able to activate, ensuring more than 11,000 student-athletes could be included and compensated in the game. It's a great representation of how we think about college sports.
We'd love to do the same for basketball all 350 programs, men's and women's teams, the iconic traditions and rivalries, and of course March Madness.
So for us, college sports broadly is an exciting opportunity. We feel like we've done a really strong job and are going to remain committed to doing that in the context of College Football.
We believe that with what we've done with the teams, the technology, and our commitment around College Football, we'd have a great ability to do the same for college basketball. And as we look to try and activate against that opportunity, we'll be able to share more.
