How Formula 1® grew its next generation of fans.

A sport that did not know its future audience

Since Liberty Media's takeover in 2017, Formula 1® had built serious digital infrastructure. What it lacked was evidence about the audience that would sustain the sport for the next thirty years. Kids were not a demographic the sport had systematically measured, and assumptions about how young fans discover motorsport were largely untested.

Without that read, any investment in a younger fanbase was a guess. The sport needed to know where young attention actually sat, in which markets, and through which entry points.

Real-time data across markets, plus qualitative depth

From March 2019, The Insights Family gave Formula 1® access to real-time data across several key markets, alongside qualitative research. Rather than a one-off study, the sport could watch fandom form and shift as it happened.

Three entry points emerged from the data, and none of them was the race itself.

Esports and gaming.Globally, 41% of kids aged 3 to 18 engaged with esports, up 22% year on year. Younger boys in particular were drawn to the official F1 games, which put them in the cockpit at track level. The F1 Esports Series and Virtual Grands Prix, running through the pandemic with drivers including Lando Norris, George Russell and Charles Leclerc, drew over 30 million views across TV and digital, and the 2020 Pro Series saw viewership rise 98%.

STEM curiosity.The focus groups surfaced something the sport had not expected: engineering and technology came up as an entry point more often than racing did. UK 10 to 18s who aspire to be an engineer are 86% more likely than average to watch F1.

Where young fans actually are.Instagram and TikTok, not Twitter and Facebook. Instagram reached 47% of kids aged 10 to 18 globally, the most used platform on the planet, with TikTok at 27% and growing 80% year on year. YouTube reached 65% of UK 10 to 18s, a channel F1 had already tested by streaming the 2020 Eifel Grand Prix free in selected markets.

Faster fan growth than football

Formula 1® increased its number of active kid fans across key European markets by 2.85 million, a rise from 17.3 million to 20.1 million. That 17% growth outpaced football, which grew 6% over the same period.

On social, F1 became the second fastest growing sport, up 36% year on year, with Instagram and TikTok proving especially important for the 15 to 18 age range.