Sports & Fitness Industry Association Releases 2025 Topline Participation Report

The Sports & Fitness Industry Association has released its 2025 Topline Participation Report, which annually tracks how many Americans are being active and participating in certain sports.

For the first time since SFIA began tracking physical activity figures, the participation rate for active Americans reached 80 percent, which means 247.1 million Americans participated in at least one activity in 2024 — an increase of 25.4 million more active Americans per year since 2019.

“This milestone, highlighted in our 2025 Topline Participation Report, underscores the positive trends and momentum within the sports and fitness industry,” said Alex Kerman, SFIA senior director and head of research. “We are thrilled to see such robust engagement across all activity categories, from team and racquet sports to fitness activities. It’s clear that Americans are prioritizing activity more than ever and the sports and fitness industry looks forward to continuing to support a healthier, more active nation.”

SFIA’s Topline Participation Report tracks rates of activity for Americans aged six and older across 124 different sports, fitness and outdoor activities. It includes 10-year trend analyses by activity category, data deep-dives into inactivity and surveys of Americans’ aspirations to take on new activities in 2024.

For the fourth consecutive year, pickleball is the fastest-growing sport in the United States. In 2024, 19.8 million Americans participated in pickleball, a 45.8 percent increase from the 2023 figure and a 311 percent increase from three years ago. Racquet sports as a whole continued to be in a growth phase, with five out of seven racquet sports that SFIA tracks increasing their year-over-year participation totals.

Olympic sports benefitted from the bounce of the 2024 Olympic Summer Games in Paris. Many of the sports featured last summer saw significant participation increases in 2024 as basketball, gymnastics, volleyball (court), and track and field all saw increases of nearly 7 percent or higher. Leading the way was wrestling, which had the largest increase of the Olympic sports, as well as all team sports, with an 8.6 percent increase since 2023.

The team sports category continued its momentum in 2024 and saw significant increases in participation as 20 of 24 team sports increased their participation levels from 2023, with eight team sports increasing by over 7 percent.

In the fitness category, many activities saw significant increases for the first time since the pandemic. Every activity in the strength category increased participation for the first time since the pandemic, and class-based activity had its best year since 2020. Hiking and trail running continued their decade-long growth trend and running/jogging surpassed 50 million participants for the first time since 2020.