EA Sports is giving college football players a raise in 2025.
EA Sports announced on Tuesday that college football players who choose to have their likeness appear in the “College Football 26” video game will receive $1,500. They also will receive a deluxe edition of the game.
The $1,500 amount to athletes represents a $900 raise — and a 150 percent increase — from the $600 they received last year for agreeing to appear in the game. It is up to each college football player to choose whether they want to appear in the game.
EA Sports’ College Football game made a huge return to the scene last year after an absence of over a decade due to legal issues. From 1993-2013, the game was released annually and became very popular with fans (it was initially released under the “Bill Walsh College Football” name). However, EA Sports paused manufacturing of the game after losing its license to use the NCAA name.
Once new laws were passed that allowed college athletes to receive compensation for their name, image and likeness, the opportunity for the game to be reproduced presented itself. EA Sports capitalized, and fans could not have been happier.
Last year’s game, College Football 25, generated over $500 million in sales. That allowed the company to offer a significant raise to this year’s crop of players. Last year, over 14,000 college football players chose to appear in the game. If a similar amount of players choose to appear in this year’s game, that would result in over $21 million in NIL payments from EA Sports to players.
