The Stadium Showdown: Where Are the Best Stadiums in the U.S.?

Touchdown thrills and chart-topping concerts need a good stadium to shine. The venue can make or break an experience.

Live entertainment is at the heart of American culture, with friends and families bonding over seeing their favorite artists or teams in person. Not all venues are created equal, so we wanted to find the best in the U.S. for these large-scale events.

TicketSource collected data on some of the most important aspects of a good venue to find out:

> The number of music performances and sports events.

> The seating capacity.

> The distance to the closest rail station.

> If there is a shuttle service available.

> The Google Review score.

We also wanted to discover how the U.S. compares across the pond, so we researched UK stadiums to see how they measure up.

Key findings

> The Mercedes-Benz Stadium is the best large venue for live sports and music events, beating Madison Square Garden and Yankee Stadium.

> Fans love Lambeau Field - it’s got the highest average review score of any stadium in America.

> On average, U.S. stadiums beat UK venues on the number of events, review score, and accessibility.

The Mercedes-Benz Stadium is the best in the U.S.

The Mercedes-Benz Stadium beats tough competition from Madison Square Garden and Yankee Stadium when comparing the number of events, capacity, accessibility, and average reviews.

It’s official: Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Georgia is the best venue in the U.S., with an almost perfect score of 9.24. In just five years, it has hosted over 117 music performances and 269 sporting events – an average of one event every five days!

From Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter and Renaissance tours to the Super Bowl LIII, some lucky fans have seen it all here - and with a 4.7 rating out of five, they clearly loved it!

This venue isn’t just focused on entertainment, it’s big on protecting the planet, too. It was the first professional sports stadium to achieve LEED Platinum certification, a top standard for sustainability in building design and construction.

The Gillette Stadium in Massachusetts is a special place, no matter if you’re a diehard Patriots fan, a country music devotee, or a first-time concertgoer. The venue has put on a thrilling lineup of events, like Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres World Tour, an NHL Winter Classic, and is set to host FIFA World Cup games.

While the venue gets busy during big occasions, with nearly three times the capacity of Madison Square Garden, it has a train station within walking distance and a shuttle service to make sure it’s still easily accessible.

Madison Square Garden, A.K.A. MSG, the “world’s most famous arena,” is only the third-best stadium in America. But it has hosted by far the highest number of sporting events and musical performances over the last five years (1,428) of all stadiums in our study, nearly 115% more than the Gillette or Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

As well as these recent events, this New York giant has also been home to iconic moments. Think of Marilyn Monroe’s unforgettable “Happy Birthday, Mr. President” performance and the 1971 "Fight of the Century" between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier.

The best U.S. stadiums for sporting events

If you're looking for the best stadiums in the U.S. to catch a game, you've got some standout places to choose from. The Mercedes-Benz and Gillette stadiums are again in the top spots, but an underdog makes it to third place.

Though it has only hosted 44 sporting events between 2021 and 2025 – under half the number of any other stadium in the top 10 – it’s a case of quality rather than quantity.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, the Crypto.com Arena in California hosted 856 sporting events in the same time frame. Over a quarter more than any other venue. While it lacks a shuttle and rail proximity is average, its 4.7 Google score helped secure a solid 7.84 overall score.

The best U.S. stadiums for music performances

Stadiums aren’t just for American football, basketball, or hockey games; they’re also for music fans. Stadium tours are usually a mark of success for artists. If they can fill one of these venues, they’ve made it.

And which one will their fans most likely have the best time at? You guessed it, the Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

While the venue's primary use may be American football, it has been the backdrop of a few memorable concerts. Survivor kicked things off back in 1985 as the first major entertainment act at the venue, with Paul McCartney following in their footsteps.

The United Center in Illinois and Hard Rock Stadium in Florida also deserve shoutouts. Each hosted over 500 performances and scored above 7.4 overall, helped along by strong fan reviews.

The U.S. stadiums most loved by fans

Three-quarters (75%) of the stadiums in this study have a rating of 4.7 out of five, including MSG, Yankee Stadium, and AT&T Stadium, but one makes it to pole position.

Lambeau Stadium has over 20,000 reviews on Google, and the majority of them are overwhelmingly positive. One fan even said they hadn’t “found another football stadium like it.”

The Chase Center is also a hit with fans. One visitor described it as “such a beautiful, modern venue,” and another said, “In one word – awesome.”

Tottenham Hotspur Stadium named the best in the UK

The UK is home to a few impressive stadiums, including Wembley Stadium, the second-largest venue in Europe. But which is the best? We’ve collected the same data as we did for U.S. stadiums to find out.

Although it’s primarily used for soccer games, it has also hosted NFL London games and concerts like Guns N’ Roses, Lady Gaga, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

The UK’s largest venue misses out on the top spot

Wembley Stadium, the UK's largest venue with a jaw-dropping 90,000 seats, is in second place. It's hosted over three times more events than the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and is among the highest on the list, second to the O2 Arena.

The factors that let it down are its slightly longer distance to the nearest station and its position just behind Tottenham in the average review score.

Does the U.S. or the UK have better stadiums?

On average, UK stadiums have a higher capacity than those in the U.S., at 53,866 vs. 55,235. But that isn’t the full story.

The U.S. beats the UK on every other factor: American stadiums score an average 4.6 from fans, just higher than the UK’s 4.5, host more than double the number of events and performances, and offer better accessibility.

Methodology

TicketSource is a leading online event ticketing system that offers a pro-level ticketing system for any venue or event, that’s refreshingly easy and budget-friendly.

As part of our dedication to spotlighting U.S. venues, we sourced extensive data on capacity, sports and music events, accessibility, and reviews to find the best stadiums in the country.

We created a seed list of 20 of the most iconic stadiums/arenas in the U.S. & UK, focusing on ones that regularly host both major concerts and sports events, and gave each a normalised score out of 10 based on the following factors:

Musical performances

The number of performances in the last five years, sourced via Setlist.fm's venue pages.

Note: this source lists individual performances rather than the number of concerts. For example, if it's a festival, each act is listed separately.

Sporting events

The total number of the following in the last five years, note that only competitive games were included. We looked at the five most recent full seasons for each sport.

> Home games for primary tenants (e.g. NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, college football/basketball) sourced from sites such as Sports-reference.com.

> Major one-off events (e.g., the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the NCAA tournaments, etc.) are sourced from official stadium websites and news articles.

Seating capacity

Sourced from official stadium websites. We took the highest if multiple capacities were listed (for concerts/sports, etc.).

Accessibility

> We found out if there is a shuttle service using multiple sources.

> Distance to closest public transport station (sourced from Google Maps).

Public reviews

> Sourced using Google Review scores.

> All data was collected in August 2025 and is correct as of then.