Formula 1 could find itself a new broadcast home next year.
According to a report in The Times of London on Thursday, Netflix is considering a bid to take the worldwide racing circuit away from ESPN in the United States.
Per the report, ESPN’s exclusive negotiating period with F1 has recently expired, meaning the circuit is free to negotiate with other potential media partners. ESPN’s current deal, which began in 2023, pays F1 a reported $85 million per year. Netflix has reportedly hired Kate Jackson, ESPN’s vice president of production, who handled the network’s F1 coverage prior to leaving.
The streamer, in large part, can be thanked for the sport’s newfound popularity stateside because of its hit docuseries Drive to Survive.
The Times also reports that Apple has been linked to F1 rights in the United States, though the company’s preference to strike global deals — such as its current agreement with Major League Soccer — might discourage them from taking a region-specific deal. ESPN is also still listed as a possibility, despite the fact that the two sides were unable to reach an agreement during the exclusive negotiating period.
Netflix has slowly but surely entered the live sports space. Recently, the streamer aired two exclusive NFL games on Christmas Day. They are also airing WWE’s weekly Raw series, and have streamed several one-off sporting events like the Mike Tyson-Jake Paul fight in November. The company continues to heavily invest in sports-adjacent programming similar to Drive to Survive as well.
A potential tie-up with F1 would, obviously, make a lot of sense if Netflix wanted to make its first true foray into live sports broadcasting. Its relationship with the racing circuit has only grown since beginning Drive to Survive, and the streamer already has a built-in audience of F1 fans because of it.
Netflix surely has the capital to win a bidding war with ESPN as well, though it’s unlikely they’ll need to pay substantially more than the current going rate. Per The Times, “The next set of rights is expected to bring an increase in value, but still far below the kind of fees that other US sports, such as American football.”
It’s unlikely F1 moves-the-needle enough for ESPN to get into a bidding war with Netflix, though losing the circuit would mean the network’s only motorsports exposure is through the small Superstar Racing Experience (SRX) circuit.
