Want to watch the Rams face the 49ers? It’ll cost you a lot

Tickets for Sunday’s Rams game against the 49ers cost the most for any NFL playoff game. At an average price of $824, tickets to watch Sunday’s game in Inglewood’s SoFi Stadium will cost nearly $300 more than an average ticket to the Chiefs-Bengals game earlier that day in Kansas City, Mo.

When the Rams hosted the Arizona Cardinals in a wild-card playoff game Jan. 17, tickets averaged $154.

This weekend’s $824 price point is significantly higher than the previous NFC championship game that was played with fans attending. On Jan. 19, 2020, spectators paid an average of $525 to watch the 49ers beat the Green Bay Packers 37-20 in Santa Clara. The 2021 NFL championship games had no crowds because of the pandemic.

The AFC championship ticket price did increase from 2020 by almost 40%, but that pales in comparison with the NFC game, which jumped up 57%.

The fact that the Rams, a fourth seed, are hosting this game against the 49ers was not expected. At the start of the playoffs, the No.1 seed Green Bay Packers, led by MVP candidate Aaron Rogers, were favored to host and win the NFC championship game. During last weekend’s divisional round, the Packers were upset by the sixth-seeded 49ers while the Rams eliminated the second-seeded Buccaneers in Tampa, Fla.

The Rams ticket office instituted a policy of limiting ticket sales to Los Angeles County residents only for the 49ers matchup. The previous Golden State showdown on Jan. 9 in Inglewood had 60% of attendees registered as 49ers fans, according to Vivid Seats, a ticket marketplace.

The Rams front office lifted the policy a few days later, but only after season-ticket holders bought all available seats and tickets were available only through resellers.

There is a large presence of 49ers fans in Los Angeles. In a 2014 report from Twitter, the 49ers were the most-followed team in L.A. County. For the 2021 season, the bulk of fans in one out of every three ZIP Codes in the county preferred to purchase 49ers tickets over Rams tickets when traveling to see a football game.

The Rams are not the only team to try to limit the number of visiting fans. For their AFC divisional game, the Tennessee Titans limited ticket sales to the Nashville area but eventually released tickets to all buyers 24 hours before kickoff. It did little to quell the Cincinnati Bengals, as the top-seeded Titans were upset 19-16.

Despite these barriers, 49ers fans are expected to show up strong. According to StubHub, 43% of ticket sales in California are from Northern California, while 57% are from Southern California.