ABC’s live coverage of the US Grand Prix from the Circuit of the Americas on Sunday attracted the largest US television audience for the event in history, with an average of 1.5 million viewers tuning in to the race-only portion of the telecast. Based on Nielsen big data and panel data, viewership was up 14% compared to last year’s race viewership.
The number of spectators set an event viewing record for the 12th time out of the 19 F1 races this season, and the number of spectators increased from the previous year in all but two of the 19 races. Max Verstappen’s victory between 4:15pm and 4:30pm drew 1.6 million viewers, further intensifying the race for the F1 drivers’ championship with just five races left in the season.
The race telecast aired from 3-4:45 p.m. ET and averaged 539,000 viewers in the 18-49 demographic, a 10 percent increase over last year’s race.
This season, all but two races (Miami, Singapore) saw year-over-year viewership increases, and 12 of the 19 races (Australia, China, Monaco, Spain, Canada, Austria, Great Britain, Belgium, Netherlands, Italy, Azerbaijan, USGP) achieved record viewership.
The F1 race averaged 1.3 million viewers across ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC, surpassing the highest average audience in U.S. television history of 1.21 million, set in 2022.
F1 has a chance to rack up big numbers on the free-to-air network this weekend with the Mexico City Grand Prix starting on Sunday, October 26th at 3:55pm ET on ABC.