The image of a spectacular stadium has been circulating widely across social media since late October. Internet users claim it shows the stadium planned for The Line, the futuristic city within Saudi Arabia’s megaproject NEOM.
The image was notably shared on X on October 26 by Rwandan online user Edwin Musoni whose post quickly garnered 3.5 million views. The clip he shared features a football stadium seemingly perched atop a skyscraper within a futuristic city. Musoni claimed the venue will be situated 1,150 feet (350 metres) above ground level.
While a stadium is planned for The Line, the images shared were generated with AI and do not reflect the official project.
No trace of these images on official accounts
Checking the official NEOM project accounts on X and Instagram, we found no trace of this video clip or images showing a stadium suspended at that height.
However, a post from last December features the NEOM Stadium, which is actually slated to be built 350 metres above the ground. The images in this post, however, are very different from those that have gone viral on social media. They remain futuristic, but the stadium is not built on top of a building; instead, it is shown as being integrated directly into The Line.
To display this content from X (Twitter), you must enable advertisement tracking and audience measurement.
AI-generated images
Our team ran this image through a reverse image search (click here to see how). By doing this, we found it was first posted by online user “Artology” on October 19. In the comments section, the user said the images do not represent the actual project but were instead generated using AI.
To display this content from X (Twitter), you must enable advertisement tracking and audience measurement.
According to French sports newspaper L’Equipe, construction of the NEOM stadium is expected to begin in 2027, with an opening slated for 2032, two years prior to the men’s FIFA World Cup that Saudi Arabia will host in 2034.
However, while the NEOM project is far from completion and stadium construction has yet to start, the future city of NEOM already has its own football club: Neom SC. The team competes in the Saudi league and features several French players on its roster, including former Arsenal attacker Alexandre Lacazette.
This article has been translated from the original in French.
English (US) · 