After four consecutive years of decline, U.S. soccer participation rose 4.5 percent in 2019. Last year also marked the first time since 2010 that “core” soccer participation — those playing the sport 26 or more times annually — increased, rising 1.5 percent to 5.3 million.

The data comes from the Sports & Fitness Industry Association, which released its annual soccer participation report to coincide with professional and youth soccer returning to play around the globe.Adidas, in its 2019 annual report released earlier this year, stated that it wants to be the top football/soccer brand in every global market by 2020. Meanwhile, Nike last week reported a 14 percent constant currency decline in annual wholesale soccer sales to $1.575 billion for its FY20 ended May 31.

According to the trade organization, casual U.S. soccer play climbed 6.7 percent between 2018 and 2019 to more than 6.86 million, higher than the game’s core participation increase. Soccer is the third most popular U.S. sport in terms of total participation behind basketball (23.4 million) and baseball (15.6 million).

Five other key findings from the SFIA report:

• 71.7 percent of all outdoor soccer participants are between the ages of 6 and 24.
• 41.5 percent of all female soccer players are between the ages of 6 and 12.
• 36.5 percent of outdoor soccer players also run/jog; 36 percent play basketball and 30.9 percent day hike.
• 52.6 percent of all outdoor soccer participants have a household income of $75,000+
• 4,515,000 children between the ages of 6 and 12 play outdoor soccer.