The decision on the TV rights package in the 3rd division has been made. MagentaSport will continue to broadcast. There are new kick-off times.

The 3rd division will get new kick-off times from the 2023/2024 season. This was announced by the German Football Association (DFB) at a press conference on Wednesday. As has been known for some time, Monday matches will be dropped from next season. Accordingly, there will be three Sunday matches in future and no longer two as before.

There will still be one match on Friday evening. The exact kick-off time is not yet clear – but will be decided in the run-up to the season. A kick-off between 6 p.m. and 8.30 p.m. is conceivable. Six games will take place on Saturday – as before. However, in future a match may be kicked off in the late afternoon or early evening. The three Sunday matches are scheduled at different times – including 4.30pm and 7.30pm.

Magenta Sport will continue to broadcast all matches

The new times are the result of the awarding of the TV rights for the next four seasons. Here, however, not much changes for TV viewers: once again, Magenta Sport has secured the rights for all 380 matches of the 3rd division, the streaming provider has meanwhile been broadcasting all matches since 2017. It is the only subscription needed to watch third league matches.

A total of ten matches will definitely also be shown on free TV. However, this does not have to be the end of the story – Telekom has the option of selling further matches to free TV via sub-licences. There, ARD could strike again to regularly broadcast live matches on its own third channels, as it has done in the past.

The pay-TV broadcasters Sky and DAZN are also getting involved in third-league coverage from the coming season. Both channels have secured a highlights package and will thus be allowed to show match clips after the final whistle in future. Highlights will also continue to be shown on ARD’s Sportschau on Saturday evenings. The new award of rights also means that TV money will increase significantly in the coming years – by over 66 per cent. Annual TV revenues of 26.2 million euros will be generated from 2023 onwards, compared to approx. 16 million euros at present.