Key Takeaways
Stadiums are a crucial part of the make-up of any professional footballing side.
Particularly in the 21st century, many teams have moved to grounds with a higher capacity to facilitate more fans at the games.
Wembley Stadium, with a 90,000-seat capacity, is the largest stadium in England by a considerable margin.
Stadiums are a quintessential part of footballing culture, not only in England but in the wider world as well. They give fans a place to congregate every other week, roughly, and generate an atmosphere that not only pushes the team they support through each game, but also serves to intimidate an opponent. So much can be said about the effects a loud, emphatic crowd of fans can have.
The game has seen many teams move stadiums in the past, though this is something that has become especially prevalent in the 21st century, with some teams having enough money to build grounds that accommodate more fans to make more profit in the long run. Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester City and West Ham United are just some of the teams that have moved somewhere else in recent years.
With home grounds being a part of any club’s fabric, it is worth asking the question; which 10 stadiums in England are the biggest?
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10 Biggest Football Stadiums in England
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10 Villa Park
42,918 seats
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With a capacity of just under 43,000 seats, Aston Villa have spent all but 23 years of their 150-year existence at Villa Park. The club moved to the stadium in 1897 and have played there ever since. In its history, the ground has hosted games for the World Cup, the Euros and European club competitions. Villa Park has had 55 FA Cup semi-finals contested there, more than any other stadium in England.
There have been discussions in recent years about expanding the capacity of Villa Park to something closer to 50,000 seats, though no significant work has been made on these ideas. At the time of writing, Villa Park is slated to be used as one of the host stadiums for Euro 2028, when the tournament is hosted by Great Britain and Ireland.
9 Stadium of Light
48,707 seats
Newcastle fans at the Stadium of Light against Sunderland
Sunderland Association Football Club have played at eight different home grounds throughout their 145-year history. Much of their early history was spent hopping around a variety of stadiums, including Blue House Field, Groves Field, Horatio Street and Abbs Field, with the latter of those four being the first ground at which Sunderland charged admission fees for fans.
1886 saw a move to Newcastle Road, where the Black Cats would stay for just over a decade until they set up Roker Park, which opened in 1898. Sunderland would call Roker Park home for almost a century and saw over 70,000 fans gather for a 1933 FA Cup clash with Derby County, which remains Sunderland’s record attendance.
In 1997, not long after the Taylor Report, Sunderland moved to the Stadium of Light, where they remain today. An expansion in 2000 saw the ground reach its current capacity and the stadium has hosted three matches for the England national team in the past.
8 St James' Park
52,305 seats
St James' Park
From one Tyne and Wear side to another, Newcastle United have had a far less nomadic history than their bitter rivals Sunderland. St James’ Park has been used for football since the 1880s, with Newcastle having played there since 1892, the same year they were founded as the club people know today, having spent the time between 1881 and then as either Stanley FC or East End FC.
The Magpies, who have never dropped below the second tier of English football, now play in front of just over 52,000 fans on a consistent basis. The stands of the ground are famously asymmetric, resulting from a combination of Newcastle’s desire to expand and conflict with the local council and residents.
In 1995, there was a proposal for the club to move from St James’ to Leazes Park, though this caused much controversy and ultimately, nothing materialised from the move. Having been used for international contests in the past, the stadium was also used during the 2012 Olympics.
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7 Etihad Stadium
53,400 seats
Man City's Etihad Stadium
The Etihad Stadium, or the City of Manchester Stadium to give the ground its name without the influence of sponsorship, has been Manchester City’s home for just a fraction of their history. Between 1880 and 1887, City played their home games across five different stadiums until moving to Hyde Road in the second of those years.
The Sky Blues would remain at Hyde Road for 36 years. The ground’s Main Stand was destroyed by a fire in 1920, however, and City moved to Maine Road three years later. Maine Road initially had a capacity of over 80,000 seats, but throughout the 20th century, this number was reduced and dwindled down to 32,000, which was cause enough for the club to look for a new home.
The Etihad, named as such in 2011, was built to host the 2002 edition of the Commonwealth Games. A year after the event, Manchester City moved into what was their new home, having signed a 200-year lease through the Manchester City Council for rights to the ground. At the time of writing, there are hopes that an expansion of the North Stand that will take the capacity to over 60,000 will be completed in time for the start of next season.
6 Emirates Stadium
60,704 seats
General view of Arsenal's Emirates Stadium
Despite being formed in 1886, it would take almost 30 years before Arsenal started playing in North London. After spending time at the Invicta Ground in the capital’s south-east region, they moved to the stadium that would become known as Highbury in September 1913, calling the ground home until 2006.
Highbury had a capacity of almost 60,000 until implications from the Taylor Report reduced that number to under 40,000 by 1993. Expansion proved problematic, both due to residential properties being close to the ground and its East Stand being designated as a listed building.
As such, when Arsenal wanted to move, a new stadium had to be built, with work being completed between 2004 and 2006 for almost £1 billion. Arsenal moved in the year of the stadium’s completion, their new home being capable of holding over 60,000 people. It has since been used for several international matches, as well as music acts when football isn’t being played.
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5 Anfield
61,276 seats
Liverpool Football Club were formed in 1892 and in their 132 years of existence, they have only played at one stadium. Anfield, famed for its intense atmosphere, particularly on European nights, was, rather ironically, originally the home of Everton Football Club, who played there between 1884 and 1891 until they moved to Goodison Park.
The ground has seen crowds ranging from 5,000 to over 60,000 across its history, with development to the stadium having come steadily throughout the 20th century and into the current millennium. It was only this year that redevelopments on the Anfield Road End of the stadium were completed.
There were discussions about Liverpool potentially moving to a new stadium at Stanley Park at the turn of the century, though by the time Fenway Sports Group took over the club in 2010, it was made very clear that this idea would not be brought to reality.
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4 London Stadium
62,500 seats
Opened in May 2012, the London Stadium was first known as the Olympic Stadium after the prestigious event for which it was built. Upon the conclusion of the Games, the stadium was repurposed to be used for multiple events, such as football.
West Ham United, who have been known as such since 1900, moved to the Boleyn Ground in 1904. The stadium, often also called Upton Park, had a capacity of around 35,000 seats and served as the Hammers’ home for 112 years until 2016. Having proposed the move some years prior, it was approved in 2011.
Having agreed a 99-year lease to play football at the London Stadium, West Ham played their final game at Upton Park towards the end of the 2015/16 Premier League season, beating Manchester United 3-2 in a thrilling encounter. In the London Stadium, West Ham have found a home that can hold almost double the capacity of its former ground.
3 Tottenham Hotspur Stadium
62,850 seats
Founded in the early 1880s, Tottenham Hotspur began life as a football club by playing on public land. While this eventually gathered thousands of spectators, they could not make any gate charges, which led to a pitch being rented at Northumberland Park. After a stand collapse caused a handful of injuries in 1898, Spurs started looking for somewhere else to play their football, settling at White Hart Lane in 1899.
White Hart Lane would serve as home for Tottenham for over a century with a capacity of just over 35,000 seats, a number which, by the turn of the millennium and throughout the early 2000s, paled in comparison to those of their rivals. Spurs were interested in a potential move to the London Stadium, but it was West Ham that ultimately made the successful bid for that ground.
Instead, work continued on the new stadium they had planned on building since 2008. White Hart Lane was demolished after the 2016/17 season, with Spurs spending a campaign playing their home games at Wembley Stadium before the completion of the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, which has a capacity of almost 63,000 seats. Spurs moved into the ground in 2019 and it has since also been used for National Football League games in London.
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2 Old Trafford
74,310 seats
Known as the “Theatre of Dreams” since the phrase was coined by the legendary Sir Bobby Charlton, Old Trafford is one of world football’s most-famous stadiums and has served as the home of Manchester United since 1910, the club having previously played at North Road and Bank Street in the early days of its 146-year existence.
There was a period of time in the 1940s, due to damage from bombings in the Second World War, where the Red Devils played their home games at Maine Road, the ground of their city rivals Manchester City. Other than that, though, Man United have spent over a century at Old Trafford now.
The largest club football stadium in England, it has undergone a number of expansions in its history and currently has a capacity of just under 75,000. There have been many discussions in recent memory about revamping the stadium and it remains to be seen what improvements are made in the near future.
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1 Wembley Stadium
90,000 seats
The largest football stadium in England and one of the most culturally significant football grounds in the world, Wembley as it stands today was opened in 2007 after a four-year build that, with current inflation rates, would cost over £1 billion to build today.
The original Wembley was opened in 1923 and in its maiden year began hosting the FA Cup final, a tradition which has continued to this day. Football icon Pele once described Wembley as the “cathedral of football,” a place of such importance that anyone involved in the sport can recognise it.
At the time of writing, the new stadium has hosted three Champions League finals and the finals of both the men’s 2020 Euros and women’s 2022 Euros. It also played host to the gold-medal games of the 2012 Olympics and has been used for rugby and NFL games in the past, the latter now being played at Tottenham’s new stadium.
The 1923 FA Cup final between Bolton Wanderers and West Ham saw over 125,000 people attend, a record that has stood for over a century now. Demolition of the old ground began in 2002 and since the new build’s completion, Wembley’s importance as a stadium has continued.
(All capacity statistics are from the Premier League website or the Wembley Stadium website and are correct as of 27/11/2024 )