Marketers looking to connect with US sports fans have a fast-growing sport to consider: Formula One racing.

Average US viewership for ESPN’s broadcast of Formula One’s 24 races was 1.3 million in 2025, up from 554,000 in 2018.

• Globally, Formula One’s sponsorship spend is expected to reach $3.1 billion in 2026, according to Ampere Analysis.

American brands are joining the race. PepsiCo signed on as an "official partner" in 2025, as part of a multi-year deal which included naming Sting Energy as "Official Energy Drink," and Gatorade as the "official partner" of F1 Sprint.

"In general, motorsports in the US have had trouble reaching a national audience," said our analyst Ross Benes on an episode of "In the Game." "But F1 I think is doing as well as reasonably can be expected for an international thing transported to the US."

Fueled on “Drive to Survive”

Many US sports fans were driven to Formula One by an award-winning Netflix series, “Formula 1: Drive to Survive,” which began its run in 2018.

“I think [Formula One’s US success] is probably 90-to-95% ‘Drive to Survive,’” said our analyst Blake Droesch. “Sports has appeal for two reasons. One, there's just the raw excitement of the competition. And then the second is the story, the character arc of the people that you're watching compete.”

The documentary series provided viewer access to the major drivers and teams in Formula One.

Shoulder content

As with other sports, Formula One fans seek out content on news sites and social media related to the league.

“A lot of [Formula One’s exposure] is the shoulder content,” said Benes. “There's been a lot of programming that isn't the actual live races, but that is F1-themed, that has helped popularize it and bring more people in.”

Benes mentioned the 2025 film “F1 The Movie,” starring Brad Pitt, as another boost to US awareness.

Another draw to Formula One is the star power of driver Lewis Hamilton, who became a seven-time champion in 2020.

“When you have a figure who is that transformational in terms of just setting records and really raising the sport to new heights, I think that's bound to bring more appeal to it,” said Droesch

Of course, the vast majority of this shoulder content lives online. US sports fans are also increasingly turning to streaming platforms to watch live sports, including the races, digitally.

• In 2025, digital users represented 69.8% of total live sports viewers, per EMARKETER and Inscape.
• The US is the biggest market for YouTube viewers (135 million) and social media followers (5.8 million), according to Formula One.

Signs of slowing

Following tremendous acceleration earlier in the decade, Formula One racing’s US audience has shown recent signs of slowing.

• F1 average race audience dipped from 1.2 million in 2022 to 1.1 million in 2023 and 2024.
• US viewership rebounded to a record 1.3 million in 2025, according to ESPN, citing Nielsen Big Data + Panel data.

“I don't think that the viewership will drop drastically,” said Droesch. “I think that the fans that they've accumulated through ‘Drive to Survive’ will be sticky to a degree in the US. I think that they're going to have a hard time continuing to grow the audience without that vehicle.”

For advertisers, that doesn't necessarily mean that they should be wary of the sport's growth, but rather that their targeting should be specific.

"I would be skeptical around trying to scale the US audience and instead [I would] focus on the value of the existing US audience and cater to that niche as much as possible," said Droesch. "If F1 really tries hard to Americanize it, it will be off-putting… You definitely don't want to isolate."

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This was originally featured in the EMARKETER Daily newsletter. For more marketing insights, statistics, and trends, subscribe here.