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Sport and audiovisuel
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Please note that not all the files have been translated.
Sporting events are essential media events for the audiovisuel industry. They have shaped, and continue to shape, the history of TV and radio audiences. Sport has established itself as a driver of appeal for viewers on radio, television and now the Internet.
Arcom's aim is to ensure that as many people as possible have access to major sporting events and a diversity of disciplines, while respecting the investment made by channels in acquiring diffusion rights and the interests of competition organizers.
At the same time, TV channels and radio stations have a role to play and a responsibility to support sports policies, particularly in terms of public health and social cohesion.
Sports programming rules
Reruns of competition excerpts
Under the right to information, any channel may rebroadcast free of charge extracts - summoned "brief extracts" - from a sports competition broadcast on its airwaves, even if it does not own the rights.
- La diffusion doit avoir lieu après la fin de la première diffusion par le service détenteur des droits sur l’émission dont sont tirés les extraits
- L’émission dans laquelle l’extrait est utilisé doit être une émission d’actualité
- L’identité du détenteur des droits doit être clairement mentionnée lors de la diffusion de l’extrait pendant au moins 5 secondes
- La durée des extraits est limitée en fonction de la nature de la compétition sportive concernée.
- Les chaînes diffusant de courts extraits doivent veiller à ce qu’au moins 24 disciplines sportives soient diffusées dans le cadre de cette émission.
- Ce volume minimum tient compte de la diversité des sports pratiqués (sports masculins, féminins et adaptés). Voir la délibération n° 2014-43 du 1er octobre 2014.
Major competitions
A number of sporting events, defined as being of "major importance", must be accessible to all viewers so as not to deprive a significant portion of the public of the opportunity to follow them.
- A pay-TV channel cannot therefore reserve exclusive rights to broadcast any of these events.
- Free-to-air national channels must be able to obtain the broadcasting rights.
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- les Jeux Olympiques d'été et d'hiver
- les matchs de l'équipe de France de football inscrits au calendrier de la Fédération internationale de football association (FIFA)
- le match d'ouverture
- les demi-finales et la finale de la Coupe du monde de football
- les demi-finales et la finale du Championnat d'Europe de football
- la finale de la Coupe de l'Union des associations européennes de football (UEFA) lorsqu'un club inscrit dans l'un des championnats français y participe
- la finale de la Ligue des champions de football
- la finale de la Coupe de France de football
- le tournoi des Six Nations
- les demi-finales et la finale de la Coupe du monde de rugby
- la finale du championnat de France de rugby
- la finale de la Coupe d’Europe de rugby lorsqu’un club inscrit à l’un des championnats français y participe
- les finales en simple messieurs et dames du tournoi de tennis de Roland-Garros
- les demi-finales et les finales de la Coupe Davis et de la Fed Cup lorsque l’équipe de tennis française y participe
- le Grand Prix de France de Formule 1
- le Tour de France cycliste masculin
- la course cycliste Paris-Roubaix
- les finales masculines et féminines du Championnat d’Europe de basket-ball lorsque l’équipe de France y participe
- les finales masculines et féminines du Championnat du monde de basket-ball lorsque l’équipe de France y participe
- les finales masculines et féminines du Championnat d’Europe de handball lorsque l’équipe de France y participe
- les finales masculines et féminines du Championnat du monde de handball lorsque l’équipe de France y participe
- les Championnats du monde d’athlétisme.
Les compétitions sportives qui ne figurent pas dans cette liste ne sont pas soumises à cette disposition.
Understanding the sports and audiovisual ecosystem
Arcom regularly publishes analyses of the sports and audiovisual ecosystem, the place of sports-related contdnt in the audiovisual media, and cross-fertilization between the media and the sporting world.
Arcom monitors the sports supply on television and radio. It studies the number of media involved, the hourly volume, the type of programs concerned, the disciplines exposed...
- 100 days after the close of the Paris 2024 Games, Arcom has drawn up an assessment of the event's audiovisual and digital diffusion, and in particular its economic interest for broadcasters, the consumption practices of the French on the occasion of the competition, as well as its wider impact on society.
Report on audiovisual and digital diffusion for the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games
- The sports-related contdnt consumption barometer, which aims to gather and annualize the collection of indicators concerning sports demand in audiovisual and digital media, confirms the popular and unifying nature of sports-related contdnt, followed by 73% of French people. More broadly, the study highlights the emergence of new habits in sports-related consumption, both in terms of the content watched and the modes of access used.
Barometer of sports program consumption
More and more sports are being shown on television, and are still consumed live. The value of the sports rights acquisition market has been growing for several years, as has the number of players on the market.
At the same time, the importance of non-linear consumption of audio and video content, on media other than the TV set, and the growing importance of digital platforms, point to new ways of consuming sports-related contdnt, and potential competition for TV publishers.
Arcom monitors the sports rights market:
- monitoring purchases (competitions concerned, contract periods, etc.)
- market concentration
- market value
- competition
- underlying economic challenges
- emergence of new players, etc.
It also analyzes :
- the weight of the media in the sports economy
- the importance of sports-related contdnt in the media economy.
Strengthening the visibility of parasport in the audiovisual media
Media coverage of parasport helps to increase the visibility of people with disabilities on television, but also to change perceptions of disability.
Improving the representation of disability and accessibility in audiovisual programmes and digital content is one of Arcom's core missions.
Arcom's work focuses on three main areas:
- Accessibility of digital programmes and content...
- Representation of disability on television.
- Professional integration of people with disabilities in companies in the audiovisual sector.
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The impact of the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games
Three quarters of viewers acknowledge that the 2024 Paralympic Games have changed their view of disability, a figure that rises to 79% among those under 35.
The event greatly improved the visibility of parasports, both in terms of understanding the rules (86%) and knowledge of the athletes (91%).
As a result, 52% of French people say they would watch more parasports if there were more available on television, a figure that is up 4 points from December 2023.
The "Let's Play Together" awareness campaign
Arcom's "Jouons Ensemble" (Let's Play Together) initiative encourages broadcast media, radio and television stations to give more airtime and coverage to parasports.
On Thursday, October 2, 2025, Arcom organised a progress report on the subject, attended by Martin Ajdari, President of Arcom, Laurence Pécaut-Rivolier, member of the college, the Ministers for Sport and for Autonomy and Disability, as well as representatives of the audiovisual media and associations.
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Find a suitable sports facility near you
The HandiGuide des sports is an interactive directory of sports facilities that declare themselves to be accessible or capable of accommodating disabled athletes. It informs disabled people about the sports activities available to them based on the accessibility of sports facilities near their place of residence.
To find facilities and physical and sporting activities near you that are adapted to your disability, use the Handiguide des sports (Sports Guide for People with Disabilities).
Promoting women's sport in the media
French women love sport, and the audiovisual media are increasingly catering to them. Every year, Arcom promotes the French audiovisual landscape through a media campaign.
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The "Women's Sport Forever" initiative
"Sport féminin toujours" (Women's Sport Forever) celebrates women's participation in sport and anchors women's sport in everyday life. National and local television and radio stations are adapting their programmes and covering women's sport in various formats (broadcasts, magazines, documentaries, interviews, reports) around 4 main themes:
- the development of women's participation in sport
- the presence of women in sports governing bodies
- the economics of women's sport
- media coverage of women's sport.
Combating piracy of sports broadcasts
Arcom is committed to combating sports piracy, particularly the illegal live streaming of sporting events on the internet.
The new measure, introduced into the French Sports Code, takes into account the urgency inherent in live audiovisual broadcasts of sporting events ("live streaming"), as the damage caused in such situations is instantaneous and irreversible.
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Fighting doping and protecting athletes
Since 2012, television publishers who show sports programs have been required to contribute to the fight against doping and the protection of people practicing physical and sports activities (deliberation of June 26, 2012).
Every year since 2012, Arcom has produced a report on the application of this action. These reports have established that not all publishers were complying with it, even though their number was increasing. Faced with this finding, in 2016 Arcom carried out a wide-ranging consultation with all stakeholders (representatives of the authorities, television service editors, players from the sporting world).
This consultation led to the publication ofa new deliberation on the subject in May 2017. The new scheme must achieve the best possible balance between the public health objectives pursued and the contribution capacities of audiovisual publishers. Compared with the previous deliberation, several developments should be noted:
- a more precise definition of the two themes to be addressed,
- The scope of the deliberation has been extended to include local television stations,
- the obligation to show one new program per year on the subject,
- an incentive for publishers to share the targeted content on their catch-up TV platform and relay it on their digital media.
Fight agains doping and protection of people practising physical and sports activities - Report 2022 and 2023
Arcom has published its report on the application of the deliberation of May 17, 2017 on the fight against doping and the protection of people practicing physical activities and sports, for the fiscal years 2022 and 2023.
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