Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter Shakira returns to the global stage with Dai Dai, the official song of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. It is the second time the “World Cup Queen” has written for the football tournament. Her first track, Waka Waka (This Time for Africa) for the 2010 competition in South Africa, is among the most streamed World Cup songs ever. While not without controversy – more on that later – it garnered more than a billion streams on Spotify alone.
Dai Dai, the song for this summer’s tournament in the United States, Mexico and Canada, borrows its title from Italian. The phrase means “come on, come on” and is used to urge someone to give their best. The lyrics switch between English, Spanish, Italian, French and Japanese and are along the same lines.
International in scope, Dai Dai illustrates the multi-layered intellectual property (IP) rights in music that an official World Cup song carries as it reaches audiences live and at home.
Copyright in Dai Dai
The first right applying to Dai Dai is the copyright in the composition, or underlying music and lyrics, that belongs to the songwriters.
For a track this prominent, you might expect the credits to be settled and clear. But a quick search online shows how tricky music metadata can be, even at the very top.
For Dai Dai, Shakira and Nigerian singer-songwriter Burna Boy are credited alongside a range of co-writers and producers. Going by the official Spotify listing, Burna Boy and Shakira are listed as performers on the track.
According to information delivered to Sony Music Publishing (SMP), Burna Boy is also listed as a 5 per cent co-writer under his full name, Damini Ebunoluwa Ogulu. SMP directly lists the writers as Shakira Mebarak, Ed Sheeran and Jon Bellion. Songwriting credits also go to Ahmed Saghir and Alexander “A.C.” Castillo Vasquez. Shakira and A.C. doubled as producers.
Aside from writers’ credits, there is the sound or master recording, which is typically owned or controlled by the record label that financed it. Dai Dai was released by Sony Music Latin and Ace Entertainment on May 15, 2026. The listing reads “2026 Ace Entertainment SARL, under exclusive license to Sony Music Entertainment US Latin LLC”, meaning Sony acts as distributor.
Streaming of Dai Dai
The song has hit all major streaming platforms, which are covered by the making available right, also known as digital performance right, for the public performance of the work via streaming.
The master recording right also applies here, to the use of the recorded track itself, and the publishing right covers the underlying composition. All translate into royalties for the rights holders, though, as we’ll see, the case of Dai Dai is a little different.
Online, user-generated content adds a further dimension. When fans incorporate the song into their own videos, platforms manage this through what are known as secondary exploitation rights. Content-identification and licensing systems can detect the use of a protected recording or composition and route the resulting revenue back to the rights holders, rather than removing the content outright. It is a mechanism intended to turn informal uses into managed revenue.
The numbers from past tournaments show why this matters. Waka Waka (This Time for Africa) holds the Guinness World Record as the most streamed FIFA World Cup song on Spotify and has garnered more than four billion views on YouTube alone.
That success was not without controversy. When FIFA chose Colombian pop star Shakira to record the song for the continent’s first World Cup, the decision drew protests demanding African representation at the opening ceremony. In response, FIFA and Shakira’s team brought the South African band Freshly Ground on to the track and added local artists to the ceremonies.
Waka Waka also faced plagiarism claims that alleged its chorus was lifted from Zangaléwa, a 1980s hit by the Cameroonian group Golden Sounds. Facing public outcry and a potential copyright dispute, Sony Music and Shakira’s management negotiated an out-of-court settlement with the Zangaléwa writers, who were then credited as co-writers on Waka Waka.
Shakira and Burna Boy’s live performance at the tournament
Live performances trigger performers’ rights. They give artists the right to control whether and how a performance is recorded, broadcast or otherwise communicated to the public. Shakira has performed at World Cup closing ceremonies twice already, singing La La La for the 2014 tournament in Brazil, and Hips Don't Lie in 2006 in Germany.
For an event of this kind, performance rights (and all related rights) are usually managed through an agreement between the artists and the organizer – FIFA in this case. Such an agreement sets out what FIFA may do with the song and the performance, and governs the songwriters’ and performers’ and their representatives’ compensation. It is the contractual layer, and the foundation of the permissions an organizer needs to stage and exploit a show on this scale.
Sports organizations rely heavily on the revenue from broadcasting and media rights
Speaking of scale, Shakira is slated to perform Dai Dai at the first-ever FIFA World Cup final half-time show, alongside Madonna and BTS, on July 19, 2026 at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. While such a show could easily command a substantial fee, Shakira and the other stars will perform for charity: sources from Global Citizen, speaking to the New York Times, said that none of the three would receive a performance fee and would instead donate their time to the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund.
FIFA has yet to disclose how much these donated performances will contribute to its Global Citizen Education Fund, which aims to raise USD 100 million to help children access education and football.
Broadcasting of the World Cup final half-time show
When the performance goes live on TV, broadcasting and media rights come into play. For musical performances, this engages the rights of several parties at once: the songwriters and publishers in the composition, the owner of any recording used, and the performers themselves.
Television and media organizations secure these rights through FIFA as the original owner of all rights emanating from the FIFA World Cup, often paying substantial sums for the exclusive right to broadcast top sporting events live.
For this year’s tournament, we counted 101 broadcasters on FIFA's official list, ranging from New Zealand to Norway to Mexico.
Sports organizations rely heavily on the revenue from these broadcasting and media rights and reinvest it in programs that support athletes and grassroots development. Illegal streaming, therefore, cheats not only the rights owners but also the athletes and fans the revenue is meant to serve. One study estimates that USD 28 billion is lost to piracy globally each year.
Commercial exploitation of Dai Dai by FIFA sponsors
Beyond broadcasting, an official tournament song becomes a commercial asset, and this is where sponsorship activation comes into play. It is the way an event organizer licenses its assets to commercial partners – the official sponsors – so they can build marketing campaigns around the tournament. The song ceases to be a standalone musical work and becomes part of a branding ecosystem.
Coca-Cola’s campaign around K’naan’s Wavin’ Flag in 2010 is the textbook example of music being licensed for global advertising and, in this case, becoming an unofficial World Cup anthem.
For official songs like Dai Dai, FIFA secures the necessary clearances and controls the licensing chain, enabling partners to use the track in their own campaigns.
For the rights holders, this is another license and another royalty stream; for the sponsor, it is a way to benefit from the tournament’s emotional charge. The same two underlying copyrights, those of composition and recording, are what make each of these sponsor licenses possible.
Use of Dai Dai in the Official FIFA World Cup 2026™ Album
Dai Dai also appears on the official tournament album, which collects songs from artists across the host nations. Reproducing a composition on a recording engages mechanical rights, such as the right to reproduce and distribute a musical work in physical or digital form. A mechanical license, and a corresponding royalty to the publisher and songwriters, is required each time the composition is reproduced this way, whether the album is sold, streamed or given away.
Shakira's royalties from Dai Dai are being directed to the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund
The album’s branding is itself worth noticing. The ™ in Official FIFA World Cup 2026™ Album signals that FIFA is asserting trademark rights over the designation.
Royalties for the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund
There are many points in the life of a song that trigger royalties. This time, though, the destination is a little different.
Shakira’s royalties from Dai Dai are being directed to the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund, as is her performance fee. Additionally, the singer is donating USD 1 from every ticket sold to her upcoming “Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran” tour to the charity.
In the press release, FIFA also announced that Sony Music would “match the first USD 250,000 raised with a donation”. The initiative aims to collect USD 100 million throughout this year’s World Cup to support FIFA’s Football for Schools program across more than 200 countries.
“I’ve spent my life doing two things: making songs and building schools,” Shakira said in the official announcement. “At the FIFA World Cup, those two paths come together. Standing alongside Madonna and BTS, I'll be performing Dai Dai, the song I created for this World Cup and for the kids around the world we will reach with the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund. My hope is that on the world’s biggest stage, the importance of investing in children’s education steals the show!”
For more articles on Sports and IP, check out the special edition of WIPO Magazine. For an example of how artistsuse trademarks to protect their creations, read this article on Taylor Swift’s trademark strategy
