For the past 20 years, LeBron James has been the face of the NBA. However, the league’s all-time leading scorer didn’t play in the first month of the 2025-26 season, but that didn’t impact the league’s ratings.
In fact, NBA ratings over the first month of this season hit the highest marks in 15 years, as the league recently announced. Despite the sport’s biggest superstar missing the Los Angeles Lakers’ first 14 games of the season, ratings were the highest they’ve been since James’ first season in Miami, in a year that has also seen record social media engagement.
“National NBA games being shown on NBC/Peacock, Amazon Prime Video or ESPN have drawn more than 60 million viewers through the first month of the regular season, the league announced Thursday, noting that is the highest opening total in 15 years,” Tim Reynolds wrote for the Associated Press after the league announced the news.
The news of the record ratings is on the back of the NBA announcing that the first two weeks of the season hit the same mark, and were up ‘92% year-over-year‘ in the last 15 seasons, barring the partial lockout of the 2011-12 season. Despite James only playing in one game so far this year, it hasn’t impacted league ratings.
NBA Ratings At A 15 Year High, Without LeBron
In years past, the NBA has come under fire for its poor ratings. With commissioner Adam Silver even acknowledging the league as a ‘highlight sport‘ with fans not needing to watch full games to follow, there were serious questions that followed.
However, the latest news of record ratings can put a short-term remedy for what was becoming a bigger issue for Silver and the league. While a lot of the increased viewership and interactions could contribute to the rise of social media over the past 15 years, it isn’t just eyeballs that the NBA is seeing more of.
“NBA content has commanded more than 30 billion views across social media platforms operated by the league and third parties, which is a record for this point in a season,” Reynolds wrote. “Sales of merchandise on NBAStore.com is up more than 20%, the league added, with those numbers driven in part by who the league calls “next generation stars” — like Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Anthony Edwards, Victor Wembanyama, Tyrese Maxey, Cooper Flagg, Jalen Brunson and Luka Doncic.”
Without James, the younger stars, including his own teammate, have seemingly picked up the slack to keep the league’s popularity. It would be fair to say the NBA has more young superstars than ever before, but their impact is being seen directly through these increased numbers.
The league saw a growth in NBA League Pass subscriptions and steady attendance off last year’s major jump.
“In-arena attendance so far is on pace with last season, which was the second-best for attendance in league history with about 97% capacity leaguewide to this point,” Reynolds added. “There are 10 teams that entered Thursday having sold out every home game so far this season.”
Lakers’ Superstar Returned, But Does That Matter?
After missing the first month of the season, James returned for the Lakers after a months-long recovery from sciatica. While he was previously the biggest draw the NBA had to offer, that might not be the case anymore, even as it relates to his own team.
Besides Doncic, some might say Wembanyama is slowly becoming the new face of the league. Yes, it’s impossible to have this conversation without mentioning Gilgeous-Alexander, Nikola Jokic, Giannis Antetokounmpo, or any other superstar, but the point is that none of them are James.
Some would argue he battled with Stephen Curry for who had the title of ‘The Guy‘ in the NBA over the past decade-plus. But now, that doesn’t seem to matter. They are still two of the league’s most impactful, recognizable, and valuable players, but the league is changing.
Just like social media has taken over, there are new stars in the NBA not waiting for James or Curry to retire, but rather taking the mantle for themselves as the face of the league, whoever one may think that is.
With James back, is it fair to say ratings, specifically for the Lakers, are expected to increase? Yes. But as seen with the league’s latest announcement, they are no longer relying on one player or team to carry the torch for their ratings.
The NBA will likely never be as big as the NFL in the US, but it’s hard not to say they have more well-known stars. For a while, it was James, but now, though someone in particular might not have the crown yet, that hasn’t been a detriment to the league.
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