Europa League Prize Money: A breakdown of what teams make from UEFA’s second competition

Paul Macdonald

25 Feb 2026 01:30 CST
3 min read

Richarlison, Europa League trophy — © IMAGO

The 2025/26 Uefa Europa League remains Europe’s middling competition in terms of revenue, but has the massive dangling carrot of Champions League qualification for the winner.

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Uefa is expecting €4.4 Billion in commercial revenue across the three club competitions - Champions League, Europa League and Europa Conference League - in 2025/26.

And the gap between what the Europa League receives versus the Champions League grows with each passing season.

Of the €4.4 Billion, around €387m is kept for organisational costs and about €308m goes as solidarity payments to clubs not in the league phase of any competition (ie those who failed in the qualifying rounds).

Of the remaining €3.7 Billion, around €350m is assigned to the Super Cup and women’s and youth competitions across the board, leaving €3.3 Bn to be distributed among the three competitions. A whopping €2.4 Bn goes to the Champions League. The Europa League distribution pot, by comparison, is €565m.

How this is split among the competing clubs is split across what Uefa calls ‘pillars’. These pillars are equal shares, performance-related amounts, and the newly-introduced ‘value’ pillar. Let’s see how this breaks down for the Europa League.

EQUAL SHARES

This is guaranteed money, meaning Europa League teams receive these payments for reaching the group stage, irrespective of their performance when they get there.

This pot is around €155m, or 28%, of the overall money available. So each team in the Europa League main draw receives €4.31m.

PERFORMANCE-RELATED PAYMENTS

Uefa sets aside €212m for this. A win is worth €450k and a draw worth €150k. So Lyon, with seven wins and one draw, banked €3.3m for their group stage performance.

Like the Champions League, each club then gets a share based on their final position. So Lyon received €2.7m as winners, and this is eroded down to €75k for the bottom club, Maccabi Tel Aviv.

And, like the Champions League, there is an additional ‘highest placed’ club bonus. Those going straight through to the Round of 16 (ie positions 1-8) get €600k each. Clubs finishing 9-16th get €300k each.

Then we hit the knockouts, where each subsequent round adds more money to the pot.

- Play-off Round: €300k

- Round of 16 earns €1.75m

- Quarter-finals: €2.5m

- Semi-finals: €4.5m

- Final: €7m

- Winner: An additional €6m

VALUE (MARKET + CO-EFFICIENT)

Finally, there’s €198m to be split based on media market value and co-efficient performance over the last five and ten years.

The larger your TV market, and the better your recent record, the more money you’ll receive. This is less of an exact science as the other routes.

Premier League teams have a chance to earn as much as, if not more, from the Value pillar than the performance once.

Lyon’s Potential Earnings

Here’s what Lyon’s revenue from the 2025/26 Europa League might look like:

- Starting Fee: €4.31m

- League-Phase Match Bonuses: €3.3m for seven wins and a draw

- Finishing 1st: circa. €2.7m

- Placement bonus for finishing 1st €600k

Knockout Rounds:

- Play-off Round: €300k

- Round of 16 earns €1.75m

- Quarter-finals: €2.5m

- Semi-finals: €4.5m

- Final: €7m

- Winner: An additional €6m

- Value pillar: €12m

Total: €44.95m

The value pillar for a Premier League team may be closer to €20m meaning it is conceivable for a good performing PL team to make close to €55m from this competition.

Read more about: UEFA Europa League