Picking up a new sport isn’t always as easy as showing up to practice one day. There are several considerations that need to be made when figuring out which you’ll pursue. It can take a while for you to run an analysis to see which sport(s) are right for you. The purpose of the article below is to look at two sports and give you immediate, comparable information that makes your decision easier. After doing some research, we have looked at a number of factors including price, popularity, difficulty, and long-term options to help you pick which sport you think is best for you and, ultimately, which sport is better.
Is basketball more expensive than rugby?
A significant factor that comes into play when choosing a sport is the cost. Few people want to spend money on something that they’re not sure they’ll continue doing or using. It’s important that budgeting for a sport is one of the primary actions you take in this process. Below, we have broken down some of the general starter costs that should be considered for both basketball and rugby. Note that these are just averages; depending on the quality, brand, etc. of the items you purchase, price tags will vary.
| Costs | Basketball Price (USD) | Rugby Price (USD) |
| Registration / Club Fee | $25 | $25 |
| Jerseys / Uniforms | $25 | $40 |
| Shoes | $110 | $125 |
| Other Equipment | $50 | $60 |
| Lessons | $75 / lesson | $50 |
| Total | $285 | $300 |
It is important to note that not every cost on the table above will apply to every athlete; if you wind up playing for your school’s team, you may not have a registration or club fees. Additionally, you would probably have a facility or field to play on with a school team that doesn’t require you to pay extra. Each person will have their own cost structure, but the gamut of expenses should be considered, especially if you are looking to play a sport long-term.
The club registration fees were averages taken from the AAU and USA rugby sites for basketball and rugby, respectively. The “Other Equipment” category would include items such as balls, headgear (for rugby), rec specs, etc.
Is basketball harder than rugby?
Another area of comparison is the level of difficulty the sport carries. Whether it’s for the challenge or purely for the recognition, a lot of people would prefer the sport that is considered tougher to compete in. How can you boil down difficulty to an objective, number-driven rating? Too many biases come into play during these debates; being a fan of one sport over another, having family members play certain sports, etc. all influence a person’s decision in this matter. Fortunately, ESPN took initiative on this very topic by polling 8 sports experts to determine which sport is harder. Looking at a number of physical and mental factors, rankings for the top 15 most difficult sports can be seen below. A more detailed breakdown can be found in the original article. Overall, basketball places 4th in difficulty, whereas rugby places 13th. The categories used to determine these rankings are as follows:
- Endurance
- Strength
- Power
- Speed
- Agility
- Flexibility
- Nerve
- Durability
- Hand-Eye Coordination
- Analytical Aptitude
| Rank | Sport | Total Score |
| 1st | Boxing | 72.38 |
| 2nd | Ice Hockey | 71.75 |
| 3rd | Football | 68.38 |
| 4th | Basketball | 67.88 |
| 5th | Wrestling | 63.50 |
| 6th | Martial Arts | 63.38 |
| 7th | Tennis | 62.75 |
| 8th | Gymnastics | 62.50 |
| 9th | Baseball / Softball | 62.25 |
| 10th | Soccer | 61.50 |
| 11th | Skiing: Alpine | 60.63 |
| 12th | Water Polo | 60.63 |
| 13th | Rugby | 60.50 |
| 14th | Lacrosse | 60.38 |
| 15th | Rodeo: Steer Wrestling | 56.50 |
I’m sure after seeing this, many rugby fanatics would be fuming. Of the polled panelists, 2 of them have some previous experience with basketball, whereas none have any association with rugby. Keep in mind, though, that these are coming from experts in the field, including sports scientists from the US Olympic Committee, academicians who study the science of muscle and movement, multisport athletes, or are lifelong sports analysts. The diverse pool of panelists makes this as non-biased of a poll as there can be, so the ratings, while they may not be exact, should be highly accurate.
Is basketball more popular than rugby?
One of the best tools to determine popularity (or at least interest) in certain topics is search volume. According to Google Trends, basketball is currently more popular than rugby in the US and has generally been rising in popularity annually over the past 15+ years. Basketball hit its peak interest during this timeframe in March of 2022, meaning that, at the very least, it is being searched more. Although this does not necessarily mean it is more “popular”, interest generally correlates with popularity. The topic is broad enough and the interest spikes are consistent to where we can rule out any one-off, bad-publicity-interest search volume.
Rugby, however, has decreased in overall search volume by 23% over the same period, and has declined 88% from its peak interest in September of 2007. Now, these are all relative comparisons and are only one-dimensional. For example, basketball has increased in interest today relative to 2004, but may have had lower search volume overall than rugby. The point still stands that basketball is growing in popularity, whereas rugby is decreasing.
Basketball Interest Over Time
Rugby Interest Over Time
An additional way for you determine which sport is more popular is the number of resources for one to take advantage of for each sport. USA Rugby has a website that allows you to stay on top of news and information for local club rugby, register your club with the organization, and keep track of what is going on with the USA national team.
There are also over 2,500 rugby unions with 125,000+ members existing at the youth, high school, college, amateur, professional, and international levels; these are all governed by USA Rugby. Big rugby competitions such as the USA Sevens and the Collegiate Rugby Championships draw crowds in the tens of thousands annually.
If we are looking to compare these two sports from a participation basis, rugby gets eclipsed by basketball tremendously. According to the National Sporting Goods Association, around 26 million Americans play basketball in some capacity. Although this isn’t a pure apples-to-apples comparison with the participation in rugby (basketball metric is all participation while rugby is participation on a union team), it is highly improbable that the gap between the two numbers would be equalized when considering casual rugby players as well.
For athletes who are not currently in their season or are looking to join a league, the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) is a multi-sport organization that allows players to maintain their training and conditioning by participating in events held by the organization. The AAU has 700,000+ members and offers a league for basketball, but not rugby. Being one of the more prominent organizations in American sports, it serves as an accurate gauge for determining which sport is more prevalent. Given the fact that rugby isn’t supported by this organization shows that, at the very least, there is not enough demand for them to create a rugby league.
Lastly, a lot of gyms have basketball facilities that their members can take advantage of (Lifetime, Equinox, etc.). This just provides further assurance that basketball prevails over rugby when it boils down to casual and professional interest.
Does basketball or rugby have better long-term options?
Basketball comes out as the winner when considering the number of facilities and resources available to the public. From the details above, you can see that there are enough choices for both sports if you’re looking to engage in either. However, when taking a top-down approach in analyzing the options at a professional level, you’ll notice that the biggest stages for rugby are arguably the Olympics, Major League Rugby (MLR), and a few international rugby leagues (largely in the South Pacific). For basketball, you have the NBA, the Olympics, many prominent European and Asian basketball leagues, etc.
Over 100 countries have their own basketball leagues or teams for men and women, coming out to over 150 active leagues. For rugby, the biggest leagues are MLR, National Rugby League, and the Super League and there are only about 80 national teams that exist. Based on this information, basketball definitely has a larger presence on the American and global stages.
In Conclusion: Basketball vs. Rugby
In short, there is no way to determine for certain which sport is truly “better”; however, based on the information presented above, considering both objective and subjective factors, basketball definitely comes out as the winner in this comparison.