The company announced on Wednesday, ahead of an advertiser presentation in New York, that the league will be the global home of two soccer competitions on December 25. The games fall on a Wednesday this year.
The teams for the games will be announced Wednesday night along with the rest of the NFL schedule. Netflix said it will also stream at least one NFL Christmas game in 2025 and 2026 as part of its three-year deal with the league.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
"We couldn't be more excited to be the first professional sports league to partner with Netflix to bring these live games to fans around the world," said Hans Schroeder, the NFL's vice president of media distribution.
The NFL's existing TV partners, which pay a combined $11 billion in annual rights fees, have been asked to bid on the games, according to two people familiar with the talks but not authorized to comment.
The fact that the NFL can subtract two games from existing NFL packages and ask media partners to pay for them again because they will take a vacation outside normal times on Thursday, Sunday and Monday night shows the league's clout. Ratings for NFL games are above everything else on television.
Christmas games are the second NFL package sent to a broadcaster. Amazon Prime owns the rights to "Thursday Night Football."
Earlier this year, Netflix announced that it would host WWE Raw starting in January 2025, and in July it announced that it would host live boxing matches featuring YouTuber and boxer Jake Paul and Mike Tyson. Other live sporting events streaming on Netflix include a tennis exhibition match and a golf tournament.
