- IndyCar sees 45% YoY audience boost for Fox debut
- Nascar Cup Series audience up 12% YoY through first four races
IndyCar’s debut on Fox was the most-watched race for the series, outside of the Indianapolis 500, since 2011.
An average of 1.42 million viewers watched reigning champion Álex Palou take victory for Chip Ganassi Racing at the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, up 45 per cent on last year’s season-opening race.
This was the first race on Fox as part of IndyCar’s new media rights deal in the US, which is worth a reported US$25 million per year. It is the first motorsport series to be shown exclusively on network TV in the US.
“The IndyCar on Fox era got off to a tremendous start, featuring a significant year-over-year increase in audience,” said Mark Miles, president and chief executive of Penske Entertainment.
“This is further evidence of our sport’s momentum is accelerating rapidly and that the growth strategies we have in place are working. Fox offers an unrivaled platform featuring massive exposure and promotion, and we’re looking forward to the season ahead.”
IndyCar had a successful relationship with NBC for nearly two decades, but the final season of that partnership struggled to deliver solid viewership. Official figures weren't released for all races, but estimates put 2024's average audience at around 840,000, a 20 per cent drop compared to 2023.
Fox's debut lays the foundations for a strong recovery for the series, with the promising start born out of a more proactive approach to marketing than IndyCar has received previously.
The series' new broadcast partner created three advertisements centred around star drivers Josef Newgarden, Pato O'Ward, and Palou, all of which were heavily promoted when Fox aired the National Football League's (NFL) Super Bowl earlier this year.
With Super Bowl adverts reportedly costing up to US$8 million for a 30-second slot, Fox's decision to give IndyCar such high-profile visibility seems to be paying off so far.
Meanwhile, Nascar's strong start to 2025 continued at the Circuit of The Americas (COTA) as an average of 4.13 million viewers on Fox saw Joe Gibbs Racing's Christopher Bell take his second Cup Series win in a row.
This was down five per cent on last season's comparable race in Las Vegas, but was up 25 per cent on the 2024 race at COTA which only averaged an audience of 3.31 million.
Last weekend's event was the most-watched road or street course since the Chicago Street Race in 2023, which averaged 4.63 million viewers.
This also means that the Nascar Cup Series audience is up 12 per cent through the first four races of the season year-over-year (YoY), although it has failed to match viewership for the same period in 2023 (5.03 million) and 2022 (5.57 million).
The second-tier Nascar Xfinity Series is similarly up 37 per cent through the same period YoY, having averaged 1.12 million viewers on The CW at COTA.
Elsewhere, MotoGP aired on FS1 as part of its new broadcast deal with Fox in the US, but viewership figures have not yet been made available. The Thai Grand Prix audience is likely to be underwhelming, though, as it aired in the middle of the night in the US.
Related posts
- IndyCar’s TV deal with Fox: Why has the series left NBC and what does the move mean for its future?
- Nascar’s US$7.7bn TV deal: Why the annual value went up, who gets what, and the impact on fans
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