1,000 $50 World Cup Tickets For NYC Lottery

Mayor Zohran Mamdani said on May 21 that New York City will offer 1,000 FIFA World Cup 2026 tickets to city residents for $50 each, a sharply discounted allotment tied to seven matches at MetLife Stadium. The city said the tickets were secured with the New York New Jersey Host Committee and will be available only through a resident lottery. Entry is scheduled to open Monday, May 25, at 10 a.m. and close Saturday, May 30, at midnight. Winners will be selected at random and can buy up to two tickets each, according to the mayor’s office. ### Who actually gets access to these tickets? New York City residents age 15 and older can enter the lottery, according to the mayor’s office. The city said entrants may submit one entry per day during the application window, with a daily cap of 50,000 entries. Winners are scheduled to be notified on Wednesday, June 3. (nyc.gov) The tickets will be nontransferable, and the city said they will be handed directly to winners at the official boarding location on the day of each match. That distribution method is meant to limit resale and scalping, according to the announcement. (nyc.gov) ### What does $50 buy? The $50 price covers a seat and free round-trip bus transportation to MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, the city said. The seven-match allotment spans five group-stage games and two knockout-round games, with about 150 tickets allocated per match. (nyc.gov) FIFA’s official ticketing pages say World Cup 2026 tickets are sold through phased draws and other official channels, and FIFA said nearly 2 million tickets were sold in the first two general-public phases. The city’s $50 program sits outside those broad public sales and gives residents a separate, limited local pool. (nyc.gov) ### Which matches are part of the New York-New Jersey allotment? FIFA lists eight World Cup 2026 matches for the New York-New Jersey host region, including the final on July 19, 2026. The city said its affordable-ticket program applies to seven of them: the five group-stage matches and two knockout-round matches. The city announcement did not include the final in that discounted resident allotment. (fifa.com) FIFA’s host-city page lists group-stage matches in the region on June 13, June 16, June 23, June 25 and June 27, followed by knockout games on June 30 and July 5, and the final on July 19. Those dates align with the city’s description of the matches covered by the lottery. (fifa.com) ### How did City Hall describe the deal? Harlem was the setting for the May 21 announcement, which the mayor’s office held in Little Senegal. Mamdani said, “A World Cup is coming to our backyard, and we want to ensure working-class New Yorkers have the opportunity to be part of it.” (fifa.com) Maya Handa, identified by the city as NYC World Cup czar, said the program existed because the mayor “was determined to make sure working New Yorkers would be in the stands.” The mayor’s office said the ticket allotment followed months of collaboration with the NYNJ Host Committee. (nyc.gov) ### Where do residents go next? The city said entries will be taken at regnyctix.com beginning Monday, May 25, at 10 a.m. and ending Saturday, May 30, at midnight. Winners notified on June 3 will be able to purchase as many as two $50 tickets for one of the covered matches, with bus transportation included. (nyc.gov)