The 2026 Good Sports Cost of Play Index reveals the sustained financial pressures facing today’s parents and young athletes

Youth sports is one of the most powerful tools for helping kids grow physically, socially, and emotionally. But for many families, the rising cost of participation is putting those benefits increasingly out of reach. In fact, a staggering 68% of parents of kids under 18 who’ve had a child in sports say they have seriously considered pulling them out of sports.

To better understand the challenges families are facing, national nonprofit Good Sports commissioned The Harris Poll to survey more than 500 parents of children under 18 about the realities of youth sports participation today. For Good Sports, understanding parents’ experiences with these barriers is a critical step in creating more equitable access to youth sports and physical activity for every child.

The findings are summarized in The 2026 Good Sports Cost of Play Index and paint a concerning picture.While parents overwhelmingly believe in the value of sports, the financial and logistical demands of participation are becoming harder to manage. Compared to Good Sports’ 2024 research, a slightly smaller proportion of parents say their children are currently playing sports (80% in 2026 and 84% in 2024), signaling a potentially troubling decline in participation. The biggest likely reason? Cost.

Among parents whose children have played sports, 26% cite the unsustainable cost of participation as a reason why they’ve strongly considered pulling their child out of sports. This year, affordability has overtaken concerns about injuries (24%), and even a child’s enjoyment of the sport (23%), as reasons for strongly considering pulling their child out of sports. The strain doesn’t stop there. More than three in five parents whose children currently play sports (61%) say paying for required equipment has become a financial burden for their family, and over half of parents (53%) are worried they will not be able to put their children in a sport next year due to rising costs of participating in sports

The financial pressure is taking an emotional toll as well. Nearly one-third of parents whose children have played sports (31%) say sports expenses leave them feeling stressed, while 21% report feeling anxious and 20% say the costs are simply exhausting. Mothers whose children have played sports are shouldering an even heavier burden, with 38% reporting stress related to youth sports expenses compared to 25% of fathers.

Parents also feel that youth sports are becoming less accessible. Nearly 8 in 10 (77%) believe the growth of private clubs and travel teams is pricing many children out of participation. At the same time, 67% say affordable or public-school sports options have declined over the past five years, and 56% report there aren’t enough viable youth recreational or intramural programs in their communities. These concerns are echoed by the organizations working to provide access, with 87% of the youth programs Good Sports serves saying they may be forced to reduce programming or limit enrollment within the next year due to the rising costs of equipment.*

While most people agree that sports are essential to children’s physical, social, and emotional development, access is increasingly determined by a family’s financial resources rather than a child’s passion or potential. Demand for affordable community sports programs remains high, with nearly nine in ten of the youth programs Good Sports serves (88%) reporting that children in their communities want to participate in sports but are unable to because they lack the necessary resources.* As affordable opportunities continue to disappear and the cost of participation rises, more families are being forced to make impossible choices, leaving far too many young people on the sidelines.

These findings underscore an urgent need to expand affordable, accessible youth sports opportunities. Every child deserves the chance to play, grow, and thrive through sport, regardless of their family’s income.

For full results of The 2026 Good Sports Cost of Play Index, including insight on the sacrifices parents are making to keep their kids in sports and demographic disparities, please contact goodsports@allisonworldwide.com. To accurately source this data in the public domain, please reference it as “The Good Sports Cost of Play Index, conducted by The Harris Poll”.

About Good Sports 

Good Sports is a national nonprofit that drives equitable access in youth sports and physical activity by supporting children in high-need communities to achieve their greatest potential, on the field and in life. Since 2003, Good Sports has delivered more than $137 million in brand-new sports equipment, apparel, and footwear to over 11 million children across the country. Good Sports partners with leading sporting goods brands, corporations, foundations, and individuals to ensure that cost is never the reason a child misses out on the benefits of play. For more information, visit www.goodsports.org. 

About the Good Sports Cost of Play Index

The Good Sports Cost of Play Index is a national survey conducted by The Harris Poll on behalf of Good Sports to measure the financial pressures American families face in accessing youth sports. The Index is designed to track trends in affordability, access, and parental sentiment over time, providing a benchmark for the youth sports industry and policymakers.

Good Sports Cost of Play Survey Method:

This survey was conducted online within the United States by The Harris Poll on behalf of Good Sports from June 23-25, 2026 among 574 U.S. adults ages 18 and older who are parents of kids under 18. The sampling precision of Harris online polls is measured by using a Bayesian credible interval.  For this study, the sample data is accurate to within +/- 5 percentage points using a 95% confidence level. This credible interval will be wider among subsets of the surveyed population of interest. For complete survey methodology, including weighting variables and subgroup sample sizes, please contact goodsports@allisonworldwide.com

About The Harris Poll

The Harris Poll is a global consulting and market research firm that strives to reveal the authentic values of modern society to inspire leaders to create a better tomorrow. It works with clients in three primary areas: building twenty-first-century corporate reputation, crafting brand strategy and performance tracking, and earning organic media through public relations research. One of the longest-running surveys in the U.S., The Harris Poll has tracked public opinion, motivations and social sentiment since 1963, and is now part of Stagwell, the challenger holding company built to transform marketing. To learn more, please visit www.theharrispoll.com