Vivid Seats' concert revenue fell 9% in the third quarter as the World Cup lifted its average order size

Vivid Seats said on November 9, 2026, that revenue from concert tickets sold through its marketplace fell 9.1% to $39.2 million in the third quarter, while the 2026 FIFA World Cup, hosted in North America, raised the size of the average order. The Chicago-based online ticket marketplace, which also sells sports and theater tickets, reported that marketplace gross order value (GOV), the total value of orders including fees, rose 0.9% to $624.0 million in the three months to September 30, even though the number of orders fell 10.7% to about 1.88 million.

Chief executive Lawrence Fey announced “the start of a new era for Vivid Seats,” pointing to the return of year-over-year growth in GOV and Adjusted EBITDA and to the agreement with lenders. Its quarterly report attributes the larger orders mainly to the World Cup, whose North American hosting created “an extraordinary demand environment not expected to recur in future periods.”

Concerts and theater down, sports up

Concerts, which Vivid Seats defines as touring musical acts of all genres at venues of every size, plus music festivals, remained its largest category, at 39.9% of marketplace revenue against 41.1% a year earlier (our calculation). Over the first nine months of the year, concert revenue was down 17.6% at $125.2 million, while sports revenue was roughly flat at $108.8 million.

By our calculation, the average marketplace order was worth about $333 in the quarter, up 13% from about $294 a year earlier. An order can include several tickets, hotel rooms or parking passes, so that figure is not a ticket price. Marketplace revenue, mostly the service and delivery fees buyers pay, fell 6.3%, mainly because of fewer orders, partly offset by larger ones. Marketplace revenue from the company's own sites, its app and website, Vegas.com and Japan's Wavedash, fell 9%, while revenue through its distribution partners rose 23%. Marketing and selling costs fell 11%.

The company says activity has usually been slightly higher in the fourth quarter, the season when every major sports league is playing and concert tickets for the next year start going on sale, but adds that these swings have recently become less predictable.

A deal with lenders

Vivid Seats also said an ad hoc group of its term lenders had agreed in principle to the main terms of a recapitalization. Under the terms now planned, lenders would provide $60 million of new term loans and swap a significant portion of existing debt for equity, cutting total funded debt by about $200 million, and the remaining debt would get a later maturity date. Definitive documents still have to be negotiated and signed. The current term loan is due on February 3, 2029, and long-term debt stood at $381.0 million at September 30.

Cash fell to $44.8 million at September 30 from $102.7 million at the end of 2025. The company states that its cash is sufficient to fund its liquidity needs for the next 12 months.

Losses and the outlook

The net loss narrowed to $17.4 million from $19.7 million, and Adjusted EBITDA, a non-GAAP measure, rose to $8.9 million from $4.9 million. Vivid Seats kept its 2026 outlook of $2.3 billion to $2.6 billion in marketplace GOV and $34.0 million to $40.0 million in Adjusted EBITDA. After $1.90 billion of GOV and $30.9 million of Adjusted EBITDA in the first nine months, the ranges imply fourth-quarter GOV of about $0.40 billion to $0.70 billion and Adjusted EBITDA of about $3.1 million to $9.1 million (our calculation).

Related: our report on Live Nation's third quarter.