Grand Finalists Sydney & Brisbane are the most widely supported AFL teams with over 1 million supporters each
For the first time both AFL Grand Finalists have over 1 million supporters with the Sydney Swans again topping the annual Roy Morgan AFL supporter ladder with 1,337,000 supporters. The Swans are nearly 300,000 ahead of the second-placed Brisbane Lions with 1,049,000 supporters and the league’s biggest annual increase of 223,000 supporters (+27%) on a year ago according to the 2024 annual Roy Morgan AFL club supporters survey.
The big increase for the Lions comes after the club played off in its first Grand Final in 18 years in 2023 and saw the club leapfrog last year’s opponent Collingwood, the most widely supported Victorian club with 908,000 supporters, an increase of 33,000 (+3.8%) on a year ago.
In fourth place are 2023’s wooden spooners, the West Coast Eagles, with 732,000 supporters. Despite finishing last in 2023, the Eagles managed to increase their support from a year ago with an impressive increase of 35,000 (+5%) compared to last year.
Another traditional Victorian powerhouse fills out the top five most widely supported clubs. Despite disappointing performances over the last 20 years, Essendon, with 663,00 supporters, continues to be widely supported and is just ahead of the Adelaide Crows on 653,000, up 2,000 (+0.3%) on a year ago.
A majority of 13 of the AFL’s 18 clubs had an increase in support over the last year. Other clubs with large increases in supporter bases this year include the club of Brownlow medalist Patrick Cripps, Carlton, up 49,000 (+9.2%) to 581,000 in eighth overall and the Gold Coast Suns, up 39,000 (+33.1%) to 157,000 during a season in which the Suns won more games (11) than other year since entering the competition.
AFL Club Supporter Ladder 2024
Source: Roy Morgan Single Source, July 2022 – June 2023, n=66,234 and July 2023 - June 2024 n=64,708. Base: Australians 14+.
Four other finalists experienced an increase in support over the last year including Preliminary Finalists Port Adelaide, up 26,000 (+8.6%) to 327,000 and Geelong Cats, up 4,000 (+0.6%) to 642,000. There were also increases for Semi-Finalists Hawthorn, up 27,000 (+5.7%) to 502,000 and the GWS Giants, up 25,000 (+12.4%) to 227,000.
The three other clubs to increase their support included the most successful club over the last decade, recent three-time Premier Richmond, up 5,000 (+0.9%) to 559,000 and two clubs yet to win an AFL Grand Final, Fremantle, up 5,000 (+1.2%) to 430,000 and St. Kilda, up 24,000 (+6.8%) to 377,000.
AFL Supporter Conversion to Membership Rates
| % of supporters who are members | Roy Morgan Supporter Numbers | Official 2024 AFL Club Memberships* | ||
| 1 | North Melbourne Kangaroos | 29.1% | 174,000 | 50,628 |
| 2 | Port Adelaide Power | 20.2% | 327,000 | 66,015 |
| 3 | Melbourne Demons | 19.8% | 330,000 | 65,479 |
| 4 | Western Bulldogs | 19.2% | 324,000 | 62,328 |
| 5 | Carlton Blues | 18.3% | 581,000 | 106,345 |
| 6 | Richmond Tigers | 17.6% | 559,000 | 98,489 |
| 7 | Hawthorn Hawks | 16.7% | 502,000 | 83,823 |
| 8 | Gold Coast Suns | 16.7% | 157,000 | 26,157 |
| 9 | GWS Giants | 16.1% | 227,000 | 36,629 |
| 10 | St. Kilda Saints | 16.0% | 377,000 | 60,467 |
| 11 | Fremantle Dockers | 14.5% | 430,000 | 62,237 |
| 12 | Geelong Cats | 14.1% | 642,000 | 90,798 |
| 13 | West Coast Eagles | 14.1% | 732,000 | 103,498 |
| 14 | Essendon Bombers | 12.6% | 663,000 | 83,664 |
| 15 | Collingwood Magpies | 12.2% | 908,000 | 110,628 |
| 16 | Adelaide Crows | 11.6% | 653,000 | 75,477 |
| 17 | Brisbane Lions | 6.0% | 1,049,000 | 63,268 |
| 18 | Sydney Swans | 5.5% | 1,337,000 | 73,757 |
| TOTAL | 13.2% | 9,973,000 | 1,319,687 |
North Melbourne, Port Adelaide and Melbourne are again the best at converting supporters to members
Although it is no surprise to see the traditionally well-supported clubs such as the Sydney Swans, Brisbane Lions and Collingwood at the top of the overall AFL club supporter ladder, a key metric for AFL clubs is their ability to convert their latent supporters into financial members that directly benefit the clubs.
Despite the high inflation and cost-of-living concerns faced by many Australians in recent years an impressive one-in-20 Australians is now a member of an AFL club, an increase of 4.3 per cent on a year ago. The table above ranks clubs based on how effective they are at converting their supporters into financial members based on dividing the (official AFL club memberships divided by Roy Morgan supporter numbers) x 100.
On this important metric it is ‘bottom dweller’ North Melbourne who have the most loyal supporters in the league despite a string of poor performances over the last five years. The Kangaroos convert a league-high 29.1% of their supporters into members and have improved from second on this ranking in 2023. North Melbourne is the only club in the AFL era to finish in the bottom two for five consecutive seasons.
Consistent top four finisher Port Adelaide are again highly ranked on this measure in second place with a conversion rate of over one-in-five supporters to members – 20.2%. Port Adelaide topped this ranking a year ago with a conversion rate of 21.3%. Port Adelaide and North Melbourne are the only clubs to convert more than one-in-five supporters to members and have now done so in 2023 and 2024.
In third place are 2021 Premiers Melbourne. The league’s oldest club have maintained a high conversion rate in recent years and now convert almost one-in-five supporters to members (19.8%), the third highest conversion rate of any club. The Demons missed the finals this year for the first time since 2020.
Following right behind the top three clubs for membership conversion are four Victorian clubs that convert over one-in-six supporters to members including three finalists from this year and the most successful club of the last decade.
The Western Bulldogs convert 19.2% of their supporters to members to sit in fourth position just ahead of back-to-back finalists Carlton with a conversion rate of 18.3% of their supporters. Recent three-time Premiers Richmond (2017, 2019 & 2020), with a conversion rate of 17.6% just ahead of this year’s surprise finalists Hawthorn with a conversion rate of 16.7% and in seventh place overall.
9.98 million Australians now support an AFL club, up over 340,000 on a year ago, and up by a massive 2.5 million compared to four years ago in 2020
Although the COVID-19 pandemic from 2020-2022 and the recent high inflation have caused challenges for many Australians, the AFL supporter base has grown strongly over the last few years, up by 348,000 (+3.6%) on a year ago to a new record high of 9,973,000, and up by 2,451,000 (+32.6%) on four years ago.
In addition, there are 8,896,000 Australians who watched at least one AFL match on TV, up 446,000 (+5.3%) on a year ago and up by over 1.2 million (+16.1%) from 2020.
Julian McCrann, Industry Communications Director, Roy Morgan, says there has been spectacular growth for the AFL over the last year with supporter bases expanding, TV viewership growing strongly and attendance and club memberships hitting new record highs:
“There have been several new records for the AFL this year with overall attendance set to exceed 8.2 million for the first time ever after this year’s Grand Final, and an estimated 8.9 million Australians watching an AFL match on TV at sometime in the last year – up by over 1.2 million (+16.1%) compared to four years ago in 2020.
“Alongside record crowds and TV viewership there are already records being broken in club support. The latest AFL membership numbers show a record of over 1.3 million Australians are now members of an AFL club – fast closing in on 1-in-20 Australians.
“Alongside record membership numbers there are also new records being broken in terms of wider club supporter levels. A total of 9.98 million Australians now say they support an AFL club – equivalent to 45% of the population aged 14+.
“This is up an impressive 348,000 (+3.6%) on a year ago and up a staggering 2.5 million on four years ago – an increase of 32.6%. The rapid growth during the past four years which included an unprecedented global pandemic followed by a large spike in inflation shows how important Australian Football is to many millions of Australians.
“The increase in club supporter levels has translated into increases for 13 out of the AFL’s 18 clubs over the last year and this year’s two Grand Finalists are the two most widely supported clubs in Australia for the first time.
“For an incredible 19th straight year it is the Sydney Swans on top with 1.34 million supporters with the club set to contest its seventh Grand Final in the last 20 years this weekend.
“For the first time in years the Swans have a serious challenger for the most widely supported AFL club in the land with the Brisbane Lions in a clear second place with 1.05 million supporters – a stellar increase of 223,000 (+27%) on a year ago.
“The Lions were the last club, apart from the Sydney Swans, to top the annual Roy Morgan AFL Club supporter ladder – way back in 2004 – after the club contested four straight Grand Finals – winning three of them (2001, 2002 and 2003).
“However, despite this year’s large increase the Lions still have a long way to go to catch the Swans, with the New South Wales based club nearly 300,000 in front of the team from Queensland.
“In a clear third place is Victorian powerhouse, and reigning 2023 Premiers, Collingwood, with 908,000 supporters, an increase of 33,000 (+3.8%) on a year ago – well over 200,000 ahead of any other Victorian-based club.
“Several other high-profile clubs have broad-based supporter bases including the West Coast Eagles with 732,000 supporters, Essendon with 663,000 supporters, the Adelaide Crows with 653,000 supporters and beaten Preliminary Finalists Geelong with 642,000 supporters.
“There are several impressive and noteworthy gains for other clubs including Carlton, up 49,000 (+9.2%) to 581,000 supporters, the Gold Coast Suns, up 39,000 (+33.1%) to 157,000 supporters and the GWS Giants with an increase of 25,000 (+12.4%) to 227,000 supporters.
“This spread of clubs means all five States with an AFL club (Victoria, NSW, Queensland, WA and SA) are represented within the top six most widely supported clubs and a minimum of at least 650,000 supporters is required to be in contention to enter this top bracket.
“An interesting analysis is to look in depth at the conversion rate of supporters to members amongst the AFL clubs. Several clubs with the highest supporter conversion rates have been less than successful in recent years with only one club in the top six managing to win multiple Premierships this century – Richmond in sixth place and winning in 2017, 2019 & 2020.
“These results indicate that clubs that have had less success in recent years and found it harder to attract newer supporters must fight doubly hard to ensure existing supporters remain as members even during periods which lack Premiership success. The top two clubs on supporter conversion to membership rates are North Melbourne and Port Adelaide – neither club has played in a Grand Final for more than 15 years.
“Looking forward if the growth of recent years can continue the AFL is set to crack over 10 million club supporters as soon as next year while an extra 50,000 or so members will see more than 1-in-20 Australians of all ages being members of an AFL club.”
For comments or more information about Roy Morgan’s AFL Supporter profiles and other Sporting profiles data, please contact:
Roy Morgan Enquiries
Office: +61 (3) 9224 5309
askroymorgan@roymorgan.com
Margin of Error
The margin of error to be allowed for in any estimate depends mainly on the number of interviews on which it is based. Margin of error gives indications of the likely range within which estimates would be 95% likely to fall, expressed as the number of percentage points above or below the actual estimate. Allowance for design effects (such as stratification and weighting) should be made as appropriate.
| Sample Size | Percentage Estimate |
| 40% – 60% | 25% or 75% | 10% or 90% | 5% or 95% | |
| 1,000 | ±3.0 | ±2.7 | ±1.9 | ±1.3 |
| 5,000 | ±1.4 | ±1.2 | ±0.8 | ±0.6 |
| 7,500 | ±1.1 | ±1.0 | ±0.7 | ±0.5 |
| 10,000 | ±1.0 | ±0.9 | ±0.6 | ±0.4 |
| 20,000 | ±0.7 | ±0.6 | ±0.4 | ±0.3 |
| 50,000 | ±0.4 | ±0.4 | ±0.3 | ±0.2 |
