Oscar Piastri of Australia driving the (81) McLaren MCL39 Mercedes leads Lando Norris of Great Britain driving the (4) McLaren MCL39 Mercedes and George Russell of Great Britain driving the (63) Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team W16 on track during the F1 Grand Prix of China at Shanghai International Circuit on March 23, 2025 in Shanghai, China. (Photo by Clive Rose/Getty Images for McLaren)
Formula 1 Hot News TV News

TV News: Chinese GP USA TV Ratings up 32% over 2024

Posted by AR1 staff

Even at 3am ET when most of the country was already asleep, USA F1 fans tuned in for the Chinese GP in record fashion!

–by Mark Cipolloni–

ESPN drew 824K average viewers (peak 967K), which was the event’s largest audience ever, Up 32% from last year at the Shanghai International Circuit.

The previous record was 624K viewers in 2024.

The all important 18-49 year old bracket drew 321K viewers, up 20% from 2024.

This means that 39% of the viewers were in the all-important 18-49 year old bracket, dwarfing (doubling +) all other forms of motorsports.

The event was a sellout with 220,000 fans, up 20,000 from 2024, By comparison, the Thermal GP IndyCar race on Sunday had less than 5,000 fans in attendance and a smaller TV audience despite being on a linear TV channel.

Huang Ming, General Manager of race promoter Jiushi Group, said that more tickets were made available for the 2025 Chinese Grand Prix compared to the 2024 event. Last year’s race was the first F1 event in China in five years, with Shanghai International Circuit having taken an extended break from the calendar as a result of travel issues relating to the coronavirus pandemic.