USA women team won the 2015 FIFA Women world cup beating Japan in the final and will pocket $2 million in prize money while Japan finished runner and they are set to earn $1.4 million. A complete prize money pool break out is listed below.
Women Football World Cup 2015 Prize Money:
The 2015 Womens World Cup taking place in June-July this year in Canada which has already got a massive prize money hike with 50% increase in total prize money pool and the winners will get double what was paid out 4 years ago. Lets take a look at the breakdown of the 2015 world cup prize money.
| STAGE | PRIZE MONEY |
| Winners | $2 million (£1.3m – €1.6m) |
| Runner Ups | $1.4 million |
| Semi-Finalists (2 losing teams) | $700,000 each |
| Quarter Finalists (4 losing teams) | $400,000 each |
| Round of 16 (8 losing teams) | $200,000 each |
| Group Stage (16 eliminated teams) | $100,000 each |
| Participation Bonus (all 24 teams) | $200,000 each |
Why Women World Cup Prize Money Is So Low Compared To Mens Competition ?
There are some complaints about Prize money for women world cup as mens world cup gets massive 400 times more money than the women competition, World Cup in brazil had a total prize money pool of around $576 million where winners got away with $35 million while women champions will only pocket $2million.
Well 2014 mens world cup was the 30th edition of worlds most watched team competition the world, mens competition in 2015 in brazil generated around $4 billion revenue for FIFA so the prize money pool was $576 million which is 1/8th of the total revenue.
while women world cup is into its 7th edition and its way harder to sell in terms of tv rights and commercial deals, having said that FIFA wants to increase the women prize money with every passing competition and that will only happen if the women version of the game gets more exposure. Right now Women game is around 100 years behind mens football which means it will take alot of time for Women world cup to catch up with mens competition and have the same prize money pool like in tennis.
FIFA gave out around $576 million in prize money for the mens world cup 2014 where the winners Germany took more than $35 million and the runners ups Argentina received $25 million while each of the 32 teams got minimum of $9.5 million which include $1.5m participation fee and $8m for every team eliminated from the group stages. So that makes mens FIFA World Cup one of the highest paying competition in terms of prize money but what about the women world cup ?