A megachurch is a church with a very large membership that also offers a variety of educational and social activities. Most megachurches are Protestant, and particularly Evangelical, although the word denotes a type of organization, not a denomination. The Hartford Institute for Religion Research defines a megachurch as any Protestant Christian church that draws 2,000 or more people in a weekend.

The first megachurch was established in London in 1861. More emerged in the 20th century, especially in the United States, and expanded rapidly through the 1980s and 1990s. In the 21st century, megachurches became widespread in the United States and a growing phenomenon in several African countries and Australia. In the late 2000s and early 2010s, they shifted away from traditional church architecture, with most newer ones having stadium-type seating.^{[citation needed]}

The origins of the megachurch movement, with many local congregants who returned on a weekly basis, can be traced to the 19th century.^[1][2] There were large churches earlier, but they were considerably rarer.

The first evangelical megachurch was founded in 1861 in London by Charles Spurgeon at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, which had a 6,000-seat auditorium.^[3]

The first megachurch in the United States was the Angelus Temple, founded in 1923 by Aimee Semple McPherson in a 5,300-seat auditorium in Los Angeles.^[4]

A megachurch has been defined by Hartford Institute for Religion Research (2006) and others as any Protestant Christian church which at least 2,000 attend in a weekend.^[5][6][7][8] The OED suggests that megachurches often include educational and social activities and are usually Protestant and Evangelical.^[9] These large congregations are a significant development in Protestant Christianity.^[10]

Most of these churches build their buildings in the suburbs of large cities, near major roads and highways, to be visible to as many people as possible and easily accessible by car.^[11][12] Some install a large cross as decoration for believers and to signal to potential new members.^[13]

A 2020 study by the Hartford Institute found that 70 percent of American megachurches had a multi-site network and an average of 7.6 services per weekend.^[14] The study also found that most U.S. megachurches are in Florida, Texas, California, and Georgia.^[15]

Churches that gather more than 10,000 people every Sunday have been dubbed gigachurches.^[16][17] In 2015, there were about 100 gigachurches in the United States. ^[18]

Several megachurch pastors also preach on television or radio programs, thereby also being televangelists. Aimee Semple McPherson was a pioneer of radio evangelism and a founder of an early megachurch. Robert Schuller, Oral Roberts, Jerry Falwell, Joel Osteen, and T. D. Jakes developed both megachurch and television audiences.

Megachurches are found in many countries of Sub-Saharan Africa, including Tanzania, Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, and Uganda.^[19] The largest church auditorium, The Glory Dome, was inaugurated in 2018 with 100,000 seats, in Abuja, Nigeria.^[20]

In 2010, the Hartford Institute's database listed more than 1,300 megachurches in the United States. About 50 churches on the list had average attendance exceeding 10,000, and one had 47,000.^[21] On one weekend in November 2015, around one in ten Protestant churchgoers in the U.S.—about 5 million people—attended service in a megachurch.^[22] Some 3,000 individual Catholic Church parishes have 2,000 or more attendants for an average Sunday Mass, but they are not called megachurches as that is a Protestant term.^[8]

In the United States, the phenomenon has more than quadrupled in the two decades to 2017.^[23]

In 2007, five of the ten largest Protestant churches were in South Korea.^[24] In 2007, the largest megachurch in the world by attendance was South Korea's Yoido Full Gospel Church, an Assemblies of God (Pentecostal) church, with more than 830,000 members.^[24][25]

Graha Bethany Nginden, is a megachurch which is one of the largest churches in Surabaya, Indonesia and Southeast Asia. The Church is affiliated with Bethany Indonesian Church.

Australian scholar Sam Hey wrote in 2011 that "almost all megachurch developments are Pentecostal, or charismatic and neo-Pentecostal offshoots".^[26]

One of the first megachurches in Australia was the Christian Outreach Centre (COC),^[26] now the International Network of Churches.^[27][28]

Hillsong Church was founded in 1983 in Sydney, New South Wales, out of two Christian Life Centre churches and has since planted churches all around Australia and the world. ^[29] Another significant Australian international Pentecostal network is the C3 Global Network, founded in 1980.^[28]

In 2005, Baptist Pastor Al Sharpton criticized megachurches for focusing on "bedroom morals", statements against same-sex marriage and abortion, by ignoring issues of social justice, such as the immorality of war and the erosion^{[clarification needed]} of affirmative action.^[30]

A study by the Hartford Institute published in 2020 found that 60 percent of American megachurches were members of a Christian denomination.^[31] In 2018, American professor Scot McKnight of Northern Baptist Theological Seminary criticized nondenominational megachurches for the weak external accountability relationship of their leaders, by not being members of a Christian denomination, further exposing them to abuse of power.^[32]

Some megachurches and their pastors have been accused by critics of promoting prosperity theology, where the poor and vulnerable are encouraged to donate their money to the church rather than saving it, in the hopes that God will bless them with wealth.^[33][34][35] This in turn increases the wealth of the pastors, with some revealed to wear designer clothing during sermons and own luxury vehicles.^[36][37][38]

• List of the largest evangelical churches
• List of the largest evangelical church auditoriums
• List of megachurches in the United States
• Pentecostalism in Australia
• St. Peter's Basilica

• Hunt, Stephen (2019). Handbook of Megachurches (PDF). Brill. ISBN 9789004412927.
• Loveland, Anne; Wheeler, Otis (2003). From Meetinghouse to Megachurch: A Material and Cultural History. ISBN 0826214800.