Nascar is in the second year of landmark domestic media rights deals with Fox, NBC, Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) and Amazon worth an estimated US$7.7 billion until 2031.
At US$1.1 billion a year, this represents a 40 per cent increase on its previous arrangements, reflecting increased demand for sports rights in the US market.
Other major leagues have also secured significant uplifts in media revenues. But unlike the National Football League (NFL), National Basketball Association (NBA) or Major League Baseball (MLB) who are seeing their viewing figures increase, Nascar’s ratings are on a downward trajectory.
Nascar says this trend can partly be explained by changes to how Nielsen measures audiences. The broadcast analytics firm’s figures now take into account both linear viewership, calculated by its audience panel, and data from streaming services to create what it calls a ‘Big Data + Panel’ figure.
While this has proved successful for other leagues who have embraced streaming services, Nascar argues that the makeup of its audience means ‘Big Data + Panel’ doesn’t accurately reflect its viewership, which remains older, linear and more rural.
Nascar chief media and revenue officer Brian Herbst told Sports Media Watch that “panel-to-panel methodology [is] a lot more stable… than what we’re seeing on the ‘Big Data’ side”.
With this in mind, Nascar decided to drop this form of measurement for its All-Star Race in May and has reported the traditional ‘Panel-Only’ data ever since. Although this measurement does not reflect gains made among younger demographics on streaming platforms, Nascar believes it provides a more realistic snapshot of who is watching its races.
But if linear remains so important to Nascar’s audience, how have these changes impacted the initial stretch of 14 Cup Series races on a major broadcaster like Fox?
Nascar’s distribution method is harming viewership
With an average audience of 3.11 million, this has been the worst performing Cup Series season on Fox to date and marks a fourth consecutive year of decline.
But this can partly be explained by distribution rather than a loss of interest. Nascar’s new media rights deals have resulted in the fewest number of free-to-air (FTA) races in Nascar history.
Fox is airing just six of its 14 races on its flagship over-the-air (OTA) network, with the remainder airing on the FS1 cable channel. Reduced access and discoverability has had an inevitable impact on viewership. Fox’s six races averaged 4.45 million, higher than three of the past six years, while FS1 averaged 2.37 million.
But, even so, there has been a year-on-year (YoY) decline in viewership since the first year of the new contracts. Overall, Fox averaged 3.19 million in 2025, with Fox posting 4.52 million and FS1 recording 2.46 million
Daytona 500 remains Nascar’s marquee event
Nascar’s season-opening Daytona 500 delivered a strong average audience of 7.49 million viewers, becoming the third most-watched edition of the race since 2020. It also avoided the unwanted record of averaging fewer viewers than the Indianapolis 500, something it managed last season for only the second time this century.
In fact, Nascar’s overall start to the season was strong. After the first five races, the series was averaging just over 4.3 million viewers, up from 4.26 million at the same point last year.
If you take away figures from the pre-season Clash event then average viewership on Fox is up to 4.97 million, the most since the 5.69 million recorded in 2017. However there were significantly more races on Fox nine years ago.
Audience struggles on a YoY basis
Analysis of individual races does not make for good reading for Nascar. This year’s events in Darlington, Martinsville, Bristol, Kansas and Watkins Glen held different slots in the schedule compared to 2025, but it remains possible to make some comparative analysis for Fox’s 14-race run.
With that context, only the races at Daytona, Phoenix, and Kansas saw YoY viewership increases.
Notably poor viewership figures returned from Bristol (1.95 million), Watkins Glen (1.93 million), and the All-Star Race (1.8 million). This marks the first time that three Cup Series races have averaged fewer than two million viewers on Fox in the same season.
Getting fans back on board
Nascar may enjoy a strong core audience but its decision to move away from Nielsen’s ‘Big Data + Panel’ measurement suggests its efforts to attract a wider, younger and more tech-savvy audience is not yet paying dividends.
Indeed, many of the other US sports leagues have witnessed immediate increases from the new methodology that have vindicated their shift towards streaming platforms.
In moving away from Nielsen’s new measurement, Nascar eliminates the double-digit increases it was enjoying in viewers between the ages of 18 and 34 at the start the season. Herbst told Sports Media Watch those figures are “closer to flat” on a panel-to-panel basis.
Nascar already has a streaming-only segment of the season through its deal with Amazon, but it may not be able to ignore wider streaming figures for much longer – especially if Fox’s new direct-to-consumer (DTC) Fox One platform gains traction.
But there is another factor that may have been overlooked. Some of Nascar’s core fans have been critical of the quality of Fox’s coverage, including its propensity to miss key moments of a race, such as crashes and important overtakes.
There has also been a noticeable increase in side-by-side commercial breaks, although complaints around advertising in Nascar have persisted for decades.
At a time when fans are divided over the quality of the on-track product, allowing them to unite over the inadequacies of the presentation seems to be a misstep from both Nascar and Fox. Fewer races on broadcast networks can explain declining viewership, but it doesn’t explain everything.
Fox still excels at selling Nascar as a major sporting event, but a significant portion of the fanbase clearly believes modernising production is just as important as modernising distribution.
Addressing this perception problem is pivotal to Nascar’s audience recovery.
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