▲ Jamsil Baseball Stadium crowded with spectators (File Photo)
Professional baseball, which is seeing fierce ranking competition even during the Asian Games (AG), has surpassed 12 million spectators for the second time in history.
The KBO announced that 78,622 people entered four stadiums across the country today (Oct. 1) for the 2026 Shinhan SOL Bank KBO League, bringing the cumulative season attendance to 12,069,596 (an average of 17,646 per game).
Notably, this season's professional baseball surpassed 12 million spectators in just 684 games, breaking the previous record by reducing the 703 games recorded last year by 19 games to set a new record for the fewest games.
Having set records for the fewest games per every 1 million spectators this season, professional baseball is expected to break last season's all-time record of 12,312,519 spectators.
By team, the Samsung Lions lead with 1,597,050 season spectators, followed closely by the LG Twins (1,503,488).
The Doosan Bears, Lotte Giants, KIA Tigers, SSG Landers, and Hanwha Eagles have also surpassed 1 million spectators.
With box-office enthusiasm continuing throughout the season, about 47%—or 319 games—of the 684 games played so far in this KBO League season have sold out.
It is also projected to break last year's all-time record of 331 sold-out games.
The overall league seat occupancy rate has reached a staggering 85%, with fans' cheers continuing until the very end.
(Photo: Yonhap News)
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