How Much Was a Ticket to the First Super Bowl?
With Super Bowl tickets today costing more than a used car, it’s hard to imagine a time when you could get in the door for the price of a nice dinner. But in 1967, for the first-ever Super Bowl, the most expensive ticket was just $12. So what were the actual prices, and why was demand so surprisingly low?
Held at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, the game—then officially the “AFL-NFL World Championship Game”—had a simple, tiered pricing structure. According to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, these were the official face value rates available to the public.
Price Tiers for the 1967 AFL-NFL World Championship Game:
- Top-tier seats (along the sidelines): $12
- Mid-tier seats (corner end zones): $10
- Lower-tier seats (upper end zones): $6
Crucially, these weren’t just the cheapest tickets for the first Super Bowl; they were the only prices. There was no frantic secondary market or digital scalping because, unlike today, the game didn’t even sell out. This humble beginning and its affordable Super Bowl I ticket face value set the stage for an event that would grow beyond anyone’s wildest expectations.
Putting $12 in a 1967 Time Machine: What It Really Cost
A $12 ticket sounds like an unbelievable bargain, but we have to ask the obvious question: was that a lot of money back in 1967? To understand its true value, we can’t just look at the number; we have to look at what that money could actually buy. When we adjust for inflation, the real cost becomes much clearer.
That top-tier $12 ticket from the first Super Bowl would be about $110 in today’s money. While certainly not pocket change, it’s closer to the price of a regular-season game now, not the king’s ransom required for a modern Super Bowl seat. The price simply didn’t carry the same weight of exclusivity and massive demand that defines the event today.
To get an even better feel for the cost of living back then, consider what else your money could get you. In 1967, a gallon of gas was just 33 cents and a brand-new movie ticket was about $1.25. In that context, spending $12 on a football game was a notable expense for the average family, but it wasn’t the once-in-a-lifetime luxury purchase it is now.
Ultimately, the modest price tag reveals that the first Super Bowl wasn’t yet the cultural phenomenon we know. It was an unproven experiment, priced to persuade skeptical fans to show up.
Why 30,000 Seats Were Empty: Rivalry and a Failed Blackout
With tickets being relatively affordable, it’s baffling to think that the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum was only two-thirds full. Despite being able to hold over 93,000 people, the first championship game drew an official attendance of just 61,946. That left over 30,000 seats empty—a sea of unclaimed plastic that’s impossible to imagine at today’s game. The reason wasn’t a lack of love for football; it was a division of loyalty.
The root of the problem was a bitter rivalry between two separate leagues: the older, established National Football League (NFL) and the newer, high-flying American Football League (AFL). For years, they were direct competitors, fighting for fans, television contracts, and star players. The championship game was born out of a tense merger agreement between them, making it less of a celebration and more of a forced corporate handshake.
As a result, many fans were deeply skeptical. Most NFL loyalists believed their league was far superior and saw little reason to pay to watch their champion, the Green Bay Packers, play an opponent from what they considered an inferior league. Many AFL fans felt the same animosity. The game felt more like a strange exhibition than a true, winner-take-all championship.
In a move that would be unthinkable today, the league even tried a last-ditch sales tactic: a local TV blackout. The logic was simple and ruthless: if fans in the Los Angeles area couldn’t watch the Green Bay Packers and Kansas City Chiefs play on television, they would be forced to buy a ticket. But the strategy failed spectacularly. Even with the broadcast ban, thousands of Angelenos simply stayed home, proving that the game’s novelty wasn’t enough to overcome fan indifference.
A Game So New, It Didn’t Even Have a Real Name
That mouthful of a title—the “AFL-NFL World Championship Game”—didn’t exactly roll off the tongue. It sounded more like a legal filing than the biggest game of the year. Printed on tickets and used in official broadcasts, the clunky name reflected the event’s uncertain identity. It lacked the power and prestige of a true championship brand, making it a tough sell to a public that was already skeptical.
The iconic name we use today actually came from a much more playful source. According to football lore, the owner of the AFL’s Kansas City Chiefs, Lamar Hunt, was trying to come up with a better shorthand for the game. He noticed his children playing with a popular toy of the era: a high-bouncing rubber toy called a Super Ball. In a flash of simple genius, he combined “Super” with the “Bowl” from traditional college bowl games and casually started calling the championship the “Super Bowl.”
While Hunt’s nickname was perfect, it wasn’t made official right away. For the first two championships, the media and league stuck with the formal title, even as “Super Bowl” began catching on with fans. This lack of a unified, powerful brand contributed to the event’s low-key atmosphere and the surprisingly disappointing turnout.
How We Got From a $12 Ticket to Today’s Four-Figure Price Tags
So how did a $12 ticket morph into one of the most expensive items in sports? The change didn’t happen overnight, but it was astonishingly fast. Once the game established itself as a true American tradition, prices began a relentless climb.
- Super Bowl I (1967): $12 (about $110 today)
- Super Bowl X (1976): $25 (about $135 today)
- Super Bowl XX (1986): $75 (about $210 today)
The key driver behind this explosion was the game’s shift in identity. After the AFL and NFL officially merged in 1970, the Super Bowl was no longer a curious exhibition between rivals; it was the undisputed championship of professional football. The skepticism that had left 30,000 seats empty at the first game evaporated, replaced by overwhelming demand. The event became a cultural touchstone, and the price tag began to reflect its new status.
Today, even getting a ticket at its “face value”—the official price printed by the NFL—is a monumental challenge. While face value for a recent Super Bowl might start around $2,000, the vast majority of people buy tickets on the secondary market. This is where demand truly sets the price, with fans paying brokers and resellers anywhere from $5,000 to over $20,000 for a single seat.
This frenzy exists because so few tickets are ever sold directly to the public. Most are allocated to corporate sponsors, broadcast partners, and the teams themselves, creating a scarcity that drives the secondary market sky-high.
That $12 Piece of Paper: The Surprising Value of a Super Bowl I Ticket Stub
While that $12 ticket might seem like a historical footnote, for collectors, it’s a treasured piece of sports memorabilia. Finding one of those original stubs—torn and used after entering the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum—can be like finding a small treasure. Given that most of the 61,946 attendees likely threw their stubs away, the few that survive are highly sought after. In recent years, even a used, torn stub from the first Super Bowl has consistently sold for several thousand dollars at auction.
The value skyrockets, however, based on one simple factor: whether the ticket was actually used. An unused, perfectly preserved “full” ticket is the ultimate prize. The number of people who bought a ticket to the 1967 game and didn’t go is incredibly small, making full tickets exceptionally rare. One pristine, full ticket that cost $12 back then recently sold for a staggering $175,500, a testament to its scarcity.
This massive price gap between a used stub and a perfect ticket tells its own story. Back in 1967, a ticket was just a disposable pass to a game that many people weren’t sure would be a hit. The extreme value of Super Bowl I memorabilia today is a direct reflection of the game’s incredible journey from a half-empty stadium to an American institution.
The Legacy of a $12 Ticket
The story of the first Super Bowl ticket is about more than its $12 price—it’s about the question mark that price represented. It symbolizes the deep uncertainty surrounding a game that pitted bitter rivals against each other in front of a skeptical public, an event so new it wasn’t even officially called the “Super Bowl.”
The tale of 30,000 empty seats, a tense league rivalry, and a hopeful experiment that failed to sell out speaks volumes. Ultimately, the legacy of that first game isn’t defined by what it was, but by what it became. Every cultural phenomenon has a Day One, and for America’s biggest sporting event, it wasn’t a sold-out explosion but a quiet, half-empty beginning—a powerful reminder that the greatest stories often have the most humble of origins.
