Amazon Prime Video has been seeing increased ad interest around its NWSL and WNBA coverage, to a point where it’s having to get creative to meet that demand.

“We cannot sell it fast enough,” said Amy McDevitt, the head of sports brand partnerships at Amazon Ads. “People are lining up to buy women’s sports and we’re virtually sold out.”

In addition to its traditional WNBA broadcasts, Prime Video has been getting brands involved through its Twitch Creator Casts, which feature various influencers streaming WNBA games through their own Twitch platforms. The ad experience for viewers on the Twitch stream is different than the main Prime feed, with the creators themselves promoting brands in their own voice.

“It’s just a unique way to bring brands in and bring them closer and do something different for the fan,” McDevitt said. “And what we love about it for our advertisers too is it’s generally an incremental audience.”

Prime is in the third year of its NWSL and in the first year of its latest WNBA pact. One reason for the increased demand around the WNBA this season? It’s the third year the league has had games on Prime, but the first that Prime is actually producing the contests. Prime took the NBA’s feed in the first two seasons.

Brand overlap

McDevitt said Prime has been “innovating and treating the women’s games just like we do [with] all of our men’s properties.” It’s allowed for more data insights and other tech enhancements around the product, she said.

“Some of the partnerships we’ve had with AWS across NFL and NBA are also now coming to life with WNBA and going deeper on statistical analysis of women’s basketball,” McDevitt said. According to Prime, more than 80% of NBA on Prime advertisers are also WNBA on Prime advertisers.

Specifically around the WNBA, Prime’s advertisers include Volkswagen (pregame presenting sponsor), State Farm (halftime) and Ford (night-time recap). Another of those is AT&T (game presenting partner), which has been advertising around the WNBA on Prime since the first year of their partnership in 2024. Prime recently produced a 30- and 60-second spot for AT&T that featured both Aces center A’ja Wilson and Hall of Famer Cynthia Cooper-Dyke.

Prime’s WNBA deal includes a Thursday night doubleheader each week, and this week, it’s headlined by the Fever and Caitlin Clark. Its NWSL agreement includes matches each Friday night throughout the season.

Prime Video is having its WNBA games measured by Nielsen for the first time this year, and like other properties in the Amazon portfolio, the platform is delivering an audience younger than linear TV — nearly six years younger (57.0 vs. 62.8). Through the end of July, WNBA games on Prime were averaging 439,000 viewers.

“Multi-sport advertising investment really ups the ante, and the campaigns perform and deliver better,” McDevitt said. “The more you add to your buy, you can re-market to those audiences and unique audiences in different ways. And there are some advertisers that have really nailed the science on this with us, and it’s informing a lot of their work with us going forward.”