Hiroko Tabuchi

For many Americans, FIFA has long been a foreign-sounding jumble of letters rather than the organization behind the World Cup, the globe’s biggest sporting event. (Where is the “S” for soccer?)

Not any longer.

Helped by the unlikely advance of Team USA in Brazil, users from within the United States now make up 20 percent of FIFA’s total global audience across its digital platforms, making America the biggest footballing nation in audience size, according to early tallies by FIFA’s digital arm.

FIFA is set to release more detailed global data after the tournament’s final match on July 13. FIFA.com, the organization’s global site, available in six languages, logged some 30 million visitors from the United States between June 1 and 26, or about 23 percent of the global audience, FIFA said.

American users also account for almost a quarter of the 25 million downloads the FIFA World Cup App has logged on iOS and Android smartphones so far, making that app more popular in the United States than anywhere else.