Is it possible to have an experience that simulates the awe-inspiring experience of being there for a major sporting event? Over one afternoon, I went to Cosm Los Angeles to find out.

If you haven’t heard of Cosm, it touts itself as a “shared reality” experience that allows patrons to immerse themselves in whatever they’re watching.

The highlight of the Cosm experience is “The Dome,” a theater that offers a massive spherical screen, and price tiers that include general admission as well as box seats and tables similar to a luxury suite at a stadium.

While sports might be the top draw for many who are interested in visiting Cosm, the venue offers other experiences, such as classic and highly popular movies — Harry Potter and Willy Wonka were two movie-based experiences being advertised on the day that I visited — as well as performances such as Cirque du Soleil.

The first Cosm opened in the Los Angeles area in June 2024, and it was followed closely by a Dallas-area location. Two more are under construction around the United States as of May 2026.

As a Southern California resident, I had long wanted to visit Cosm Los Angeles to get a taste of the experience for myself. Finally, I found a free window in which to visit for a game, and made my way to the suburb of Inglewood to check out Cosm.

Where you can find Cosm

Cosm’s Los Angeles location is actually located in the suburb of Inglewood, not far from Los Angeles International Airport and just a stone’s throw from both SoFi Stadium, home of the L.A. Rams and Chargers, and the Intuit Dome, the L.A. Clippers’ arena.

Just two months after the Los Angeles location opened, Cosm Dallas was unveiled. This venue is located in The Colony, some 25 miles north of downtown Dallas and not far from the city of Frisco, where the stadium for FC Dallas of Major League Soccer is located.

Two more locations are currently in the works and slated to open sometime in 2026: Cosm Detroit will be located downtown, near Campus Martius Park and less than a mile from the Detroit Tigers’ Comerica Park.

And Cosm Atlanta will be on the edge of downtown, just across the street from the Atlanta Hawks’ State Farm Arena and not far away from Mercedes-Benz Stadium, home of the Atlanta Falcons and Atlanta United FC.

Different experiences offered by Cosm

Based on initial impressions, it might be easy to believe that Cosm is simply a souped-up movie theater. After having seen an event there, I can say that yes, it is pretty much that. But there’s more to the experience that make it worth it to visit.

Each Cosm location advertises three distinct experiences:

• The Dome: This is the immersive experience that is featured in advertising for Cosm, and is the attraction for nearly every potential customer — including the vast majority of sports fans. It involves sitting in a theater-like setting, consisting mostly of booths and tables, while the event is shown on a huge screen that surrounds nearly all of the venue.

• The Hall: Located adjacent to The Dome at Cosm Los Angeles, this is a sports bar experience with numerous screens and large booths and tables to accommodate sizable groups (think four to eight people). While certainly nice, it is pretty similar to the experience you’d get by visiting a Buffalo Wild Wings or similar restaurant.

• The Deck: A large outdoor space located on an upper floor gives patrons the chance to sit in open air (or under heat lamps if necessary) and watch the game on numerous screens. At Cosm Los Angeles, this area overlooks nearby SoFi Stadium and gives patrons a good view of airplanes flying overhead on approach to LAX.

Note that no matter which of these spaces you wish to patronize, you’ll have to pay the general admission fee to get inside (more on that in the next section). All three of these spaces include access to several well-stocked and well-appointed bars with plenty of screens and comfy chairs.

And no matter where you’ll sit, you’ll have access to the same food and drink menu, as well as waiter service. Cosm’s menu features typical sports bar fare — think similar to what you’d find at, say, a Yard House. The portions are generous and the food is decidedly gourmet for this environment, with prices to match.

Not long after sitting down, I was handed a free pint glass of ice water without asking, which was much appreciated. And I ended up ordering a plate of fries with cheese and a soda, which ended up costing me about $23.

How much does it cost to go to Cosm?

The short answer is that it depends greatly based on the event you wish to attend.

For sports, the more high-profile the event, the more expensive it will be to watch it at Cosm. That’s perfectly understandable — and obviously is familiar to anybody who has attended high-profile events at stadiums and arenas in the past.

While Cosm might not be as expensive as actually being at a big sporting event, it might cost a lot more than you might expect.

The event I chose to attend at Cosm was not a “high-demand” one, at least in terms of sporting events that might be well-attended by the populace of the Los Angeles area: A UEFA Champions League semifinal match between Arsenal and Atlético Madrid.

I purchased a general admission ticket for $12, which gave me entrance to the venue and allowed me to sit anywhere except the reserved seating area inside the Dome.

However, in the week or so before the event, I had gone to Cosm’s ticketing platform a number of times to keep tabs on what was available. Due to other obligations I had that week — namely, I was set to serve jury duty — I could not commit to purchasing a ticket until the night before the event.

Box seats were running for nearly $100 each, and were required to be purchased in groups of four or six depending on the booth or table you chose. Meanwhile, the cheapest “unobstructed view” seats for the Dome were running for $41 each and were for the last two rows of the reserved seating area.

If you are visiting Cosm as a single customer, as I was, these seats are really your only choice. But by the time I had confirmed I wouldn’t have to serve jury duty on the day of the event, those seats had all been purchased, leaving me with no choice but to buy a general admission ticket.

While these prices were what I saw for this particular event, expect tickets to sell for much more if the game is a championship-level and/or high-demand event. Think World Series games, NFL playoff games and so on.

What it’s like inside ‘The Dome’

Since The Dome is what piques most fans’ interest in Cosm, we’ll focus on what the experience of watching a game in The Dome is like in this section.

I was certainly interested to see how it all worked, and what it would feel like. While I think different aspects of the experience would be of more appeal to different people, the one thing I can say with certainty is this: Going to Cosm is much more fun when you’re with a group.

That’s in no small part because then you’ll have access to the more prime sections of the theater and not be relegated, so to speak, to the upper reaches where you might wind up with an obstructed view.

While I certainly had fun coming to Cosm as a single, and came away with no complaints about the view of the screen during my experience, I found myself wishing for more of the communal experience that it seemed so many others were enjoying.

I don’t think the Cosm environment was necessarily fostering that in and of itself, but I do think most folks make the decision to come specifically so that they could share the experience with a few friends or relatives. While not a dealbreaker by any means, it is certainly something to consider if you have the opportunity to visit Cosm.

Attending on a general admission ticket, I spent most of the match watching from a stool positioned just behind the last row of the theater. While I could see all but a small portion of the screen that was blocked off by an overhang, I constantly had Cosm employees and other patrons walking in front of me.

Personally, I wasn’t too bothered by that. But a row of seats that was priced at a higher tier was basically in the same position, just at an angle at which the overhang didn’t block part of the screen. If I paid nearly three times as much for that seat, I’d at the very least be annoyed by people constantly passing in front of me.

Is Cosm really like being at a sporting event?

Here’s where I was definitely interested in seeing whether the experience justified the price of admission. Is Cosm really the next-best thing to being there?

For me, I’ve had the benefit of actually seeing a match at Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium, so I could make a direct comparison.

The audience for this match was decidedly pro-Arsenal — I’d say about 80 percent had some sort of Gunners gear on, with just a handful of folks wearing Atleti kits. Because of that, the feeling of being in a pro-Arsenal environment was definitely there.

The huge screen at the Dome is pretty awe-inspiring when you see it up close for the first time, but of course there are a few things to break the illusion of “being there.” Two things in particular stood out: The regular switching of camera angles, and the fact that the in-game commentary from the U.S. broadcast of the game was piped in as the dominant sound.

On the first point, I generally didn’t mind it, and it made me wonder whose job it is to place all these cameras at major stadiums around the world for the benefit of Cosm (at least, I assume that most of these camera angles are used only, or at least primarily, by Cosm).

Strangely, for corner kicks, you could clearly see the player taking the corner, but part of the goal was obscured, so battles inside the box were surprisingly difficult to see.

The second point, I had more difficulty with. This is personal taste, but to me, listening to the commentary reinforces the notion that I’m watching the game on TV. That’s perfectly fine if I’m at a sports bar, but I really think that for this experience, I’d rather hear crowd noise from the stadium as the dominant sound.

But at some point it occurred to me: All of these Arsenal fans who live in Southern California can’t just up and fly to London for this match, obviously. For them, being at Cosm Los Angeles would absolutely be “the next best thing to being there.” And there’s LOTS of value in that.

And those fans went home happy, as Arsenal won the match 1-0 to claim the semifinal on aggregate and head to their first Champions League final in 20 years. Watching the moment the full-time whistle blew and the fans in front of me erupt was, for me, the best illustration of the “shared reality” experience that Cosm touts.

After the match, the screen cut to a camera angle behind one of the goals, as Arsenal players and manager Mikel Arteta came over to one side of the Emirates to celebrate with their supporters. For a moment it did truly feel like they were sharing their joy with the audience at Cosm, and that was pretty cool.

So … would I visit Cosm Los Angeles again? Absolutely — but next time I’ll be sure to bring some friends. And, while I though the soccer experience was just fine, I’m curious to know how different sports are handled, such as baseball, football, and even my favorite sport, hockey.

I would imagine the experience will likely be slightly different depending on the sport or even the venue, but no matter what you wish to see, it’s worth visiting Cosm at least once to see what it’s like.

Watch our Cosm experience on YouTube!

Check out the video chronicling our experience watching a sporting event at Cosm Los Angeles, and subscribe to our YouTube channel to keep notified of when future videos are posted.