For the first time in history, a clear path for female athletes is being carved from the locker room to the boardroom.

Why it matters: Male athletes have been cashing out on their success off the court for decades. Now, women are giving them a run for their money.

Zoom in: A slew of landmark deals sent female athletes to the ownership box in 2024.

• Sue Bird became the third retired WNBA player in history to take an ownership stake in a women's sports team after she became part of the Seattle Storm ownership group in April.
• Lindsey Vonn, Candace Parker and more than a dozen former U.S. Women's National Team players were part of a historic deal to acquire Angel City FC in July. Parker and Vonn also invested in League One Volleyball (LOVB), a new women's volleyball league, last year.
• Odessa Jenkins, a 5x national champion women's football player and founder of the Women's National Football Conference (WNFC), raised $1 million this year amid the league's expansion to flag football.
• Billie Jean King and Ilana Kloss helped launch the Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL) this year and serve as advisory members of the new league's board.

Zoom out: Female sports legends are growing their business empires, inspiring the next generation of stars.

• The Players Fund, the first athlete-led venture firm in the U.K., added Olympic gold medalists Jessica Ennis-Hill and Allyson Felix, retired Lionesses striker Eni Aluko and others as partners this year. Felix launched a new women-focused sports management firm called Always Alpha.
• Serena Wiliams' venture firm has invested in more than a dozen unicorn companies since launching her venture firm a decade ago. Two-time WNBA champion and Atlanta Dream co-owner Renee Montgomery joined Valor Ventures as a venture capitalist in 2021.

Zoom out: Young female athletes are following in their path, leveraging their early success through record-breaking name, image and likeness (NIL) deals.

• Female college athletes are, on average, striking more NIL deals than males, per SponsorUnited, although men still make more.

The big picture: Research finds that the overwhelming majority (94%) of C-suite women have played sports, driving brands across business and beauty to double down on their investments.

• State Farm, which has long backed Indiana Fever superstar Caitlin Clark, inked a new NIL deal last month with USC college basketball star JuJu Watkins.
• Ally Financial announced a historic deal with Wrexham AFC Women this year to bring the soccer club to the U.S. for the first time. It's years ahead of its 2022 pledge to reach parity in men's and women's sports advertising.

2024 was the year more women's sports franchises finally started to cross the $100 million mark.

• Angel City FC: Willow Bay and Bob Iger's $250 million deal to acquire Angel City Football Club (ACFC) in July marked the highest valuation ever for a women's professional sports team.
• San Diego Wave FC: Owners of San Diego Wave FC sold the club at a total valuation of $120 million in March.
• The Dallas Wings: A stake sale in August drove the WNBA team to a massive $208 million valuation, despite a rocky season.

What to watch: Experts forecast the value of WNBA and NWSL teams to increase by "at least $1.6 billion over the next three years," mostly due to live and TV audience increases.

• Alexis Ohanian, an investor in women's sports, predicts at least one pro women's sports team will be worth at least $1 billion by 2030.

Women's sports are expected to drive more than $1 billion in revenue for the first time this year, thanks to unprecedented viewership and attendance growth.

The highlights: For the first time in NCAA history, the women's basketball final garnered more views than the men's championship game, per Nielsen.

• Riding the success of rookie Clark's first season, the WNBA also broke viewership records this year. Attendance soared to a 22-year high.
• The National Women's Soccer League (NWSL) Championship posted record TV viewership and in-game attendance last month, driving triple-digit gains for both.

Zoom out: Viewership has skyrocketed broadly across women's sports, according to a new report from Horizon Sports & Experiences.

• In the past three years, ratings for women's college basketball, the WNBA, women's international and club soccer, and women's volleyball are all up at least 75%.

The big picture: Higher viewership is leading to record media distribution deals.

• The WNBA cashed in on its historic season with a landmark 11-year media rights deal worth more than $200 million annually.
• TNT Sports struck a multiyear media rights deal with Unrivaled, the 3-on-3 women's basketball league launched by two WNBA stars.
• The National Women's Soccer League's (NWSL) landmark four-year $240 million TV rights deal in 2023 pushed more than 100 games to national broadcast this year.

What to watch: Women's sports coverage is skyrocketing as media companies and tech firms scramble to take advantage of the surge in consumer interest.

• Whoopi Goldberg announced the creation of the All Women's Sports Network, the first TV platform dedicated exclusively to women's sports.
• 5wins, a new platform for women's collegiate sports coverage, debuted this year, joining niche women's sports sites like The Gist and Just Women's Sports that have launched in the past few years.
• Yahoo and The Athletic co-launched a new hub for women's sports coverage on Yahoo Sports' website and app. Yahoo tapped a slew of female Olympians as correspondents for the 2024 games.
• X exclusively debuted "The Offseason," a new docuseries from soccer star Midge Purce, this fall.

Indiana Fever's Clark was named Time Magazine's Athlete of the Year on Tuesday, becoming the first WNBA player to receive the distinction.

Why it matters: The WNBA Rookie of the Year drove the league to new heights this year as it negotiated a record media distribution deal.

Zoom out: 2024 was a knockout year for several female athletes.

• Katie Ledecky became the most decorated American female Olympic athlete after winning her 13th Olympic medal this year in Paris.
• Simone Biles took home the gold medal in the women's all-around competition at the Olympics, representing the biggest comeback story of the Games.
• Ilona Maher, America's biggest rugby star, not only helped the U.S. Olympic team medal for the first time this year, but her "Dancing With the Stars" success drove new mainstream awareness to the sport.
• Livvy Dunne, the viral LSU gymnast, became the top female NIL earner this year, with more than $4 million in deals.

At least 20 teams played their inaugural seasons in 2024, according to analysis from Axios' Ashley Mahoney and Simran Parwani.

• Hockey: The Professional Women's Hockey League (PWHL) launched in January.
• Volleyball: League One Volleyball, a professional women's volleyball league, launched in November.
• Flag football: Flag football is coming to the Olympics for the first time in 2028.
• Rugby: Women's Elite Rugby (WER), a new professional women's rugby 15s league in the U.S., is raising more money after just closing an initial round.
• Track: Ohanian's venture capital firm 776 hosted a women's-only track event in September called the 776 Invitational.
• Basketball: The inaugural season of the new 3x3 women's basketball league Unrivaled, founded by WNBA stars Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart, kicks off next year.

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