Female fans are no longer on the sidelines of F1 – they’re at the centre of a seismic shift. As the fastest-growing, most culturally influential audience in the sport, their impact is reshaping how it’s watched, sold and sustained. But while their value is clear, most of the industry is still playing catch-up. This is more than a story of inclusion – it’s a business imperative, a creative opportunity and a blueprint for the future of sport.
F1 has always sold itself as a high-octane spectacle: a test of speed, engineering and human endurance. For decades, its image was shaped by daredevil legends, high-gloss manufacturers, and something ‘only the men would understand’. But today, the sport is experiencing a quieter, more transformational shift. In the shadows of roaring engines, million-dollar sponsorships and growing team valuations a powerful force is emerging: female fans.
This isn’t just a feel-good story of increased inclusivity. It’s a commercial, cultural and strategic opportunity of massive proportions. Women are not only the fastest-growing fan segment in global motorsports right now – they’re reshaping how F1 is watched, discussed and sold.
From TikTok creators who can command more influence than some official broadcasters, to sponsors who are rethinking ROI based on emotional connection rather than pure reach, female fandom is no longer peripheral. It’s central. And this isn’t just happening in F1, it’s happening across many of sports’ biggest competitions. Yet most rights-holders, broadcasters and sponsors are only beginning to scratch the surface of what this audience wants, and what it can unlock.
The next untapped billion
Between 2017 and 2022, the percentage of female F1 fans rose from eight per cent to nearly 40 per cent in some key markets, according to F1’s internal data. That growth wasn’t just driven by the on-track product, but by the cultural halo surrounding the championship: from the high-budget licensed TV series ‘Drive to Survive’, to the rise of creator-led storytelling.
Despite women now making up nearly half of the sports fans across all age groups, in motorsport specifically the difference between interest and investment remains stark. Marketing activations and commercial partnerships explicitly designed with them in mind remain disproportionately rare. And when they are, the default approach is often surface-level: campaigns shaped more by stereotype than by data. It’s as if certain series and teams are chasing the cultural relevance that young female fans bring, but don’t actually want to cater to this audience. Maybe it’s fear of alienating a vocal and more traditional audience that has been used to be catered to for decades. Or maybe it’s more simple than that: the decision-makers are still overwhelmingly pale, male and stale.
This is not a matter of equity alone; it’s a business imperative. In markets like the US, an oft-quoted statistic is that women influence up to 85 per cent of household purchasing decisions. They are more likely to engage with sports brands across multiple channels, more loyal to purpose-driven campaigns, and more interested in storytelling that extends beyond the podium.
For brands, this means a vastly under-leveraged audience with enormous commercial upside. For F1, it means a foundational shift in how fan engagement is measured, monetised and sustained.
“Female fans are often more emotionally invested, digitally fluent and community-oriented”
From spectators to stakeholders
The depth of the engagement is arguably the most exciting part of this shift. Creators have cultivated enormous influence, blending humour, technical insight and emotional storytelling. They are often more attuned to what new fans want to know than the rights-holders and teams themselves. In many cases, they’re doing the sport’s job better than the sport.
Meanwhile, women are entering the F1 workforce at unprecedented rates. The F1 Academy series marks an important step forward, and all 10 F1 teams now support female driver pathways. But the cultural impact extends far beyond the cockpit.
The message is clear: women aren’t waiting to be invited in.
Despite the undeniable growth of this fanbase, many of the sport’s responses remain performative. What’s missing is substance and co-creation. Female fans are often more emotionally invested, more digitally fluent and more community-oriented in how they engage with the sport. But they are rarely asked what they want. Rights-holders develop campaigns for them, not with them. Broadcasters segment women into marketing silos, rather than integrating them into broader programming strategy. Even sponsors, who know better, often fall into outdated playbooks.
The result is a disconnect between what women fans value and what they’re being sold.
Reimagining the future fan experience
So what would a F1 ecosystem look like if it truly centred this growing fanbase, not just as consumers, but as collaborators?
Let’s play it out.
1. Co-creation as the default. Ensure female fans’ voices are being heard and considered. The Aston Martin and McLaren F1 teams are good examples of teams who’ve leaned into co-creating with fans.
In Aston Martin’s case, they’ve created a whole campaign called ‘FanMade’ – an evolution of their I/AM membership programme. During the Silverstone GP this year, they featured user-generated content across London, designed and distributed a fanzine and had a matcha pop-up stand in Covent Garden. They’ve also been leaning into FanMade Drops: a series of ultra-limited moments and fan experiences. One such collaboration with beauty company Glaiz, the AMR25 Exact Match nail gel, was a first of its kind and a direct response to requests from fans for more feminine merchandise and collaborations in F1.
Aston Martin are certainly not the only team in the paddock leaning into co-creation, as creators and influencers become part of the establishment. And while the McLaren racing team’s takeover of Trafalgar Square in July 2025 may not have used co-creation directly, it was inspired by what fans have been asking for: more creativity, more diversity and more fan-first events.
2. Broadcast, rewritten. Imagine an alternate broadcast stream directed and hosted by a more representative cast. Not a diluted version of the main race feed, but a fresh take.
We are seeing a glimpse of what this could look like with Sky’s new ‘F1 Kids’ initiative – first unveiled at the Hungarian Grand Prix in 2023, and now returning for a second season covering seven global races. By offering a feed designed for children – with fun graphics, simplified technical explanations, cartoon driver avatars and child presenters – the barrier is lowered for newcomers. It shows that alternate broadcasts can help sport become more inclusive by using a language that resonates with them, without alienating existing audience segments.
3. Narrative depth. Move beyond ‘first woman to…’ tropes. Tell richer, more resonant stories. The depth is there. The lens just needs widening. For example, I recently partnered with the FIA (the governing body of Formula 1) to tell the interesting untold stories that happen during race weekends. I did a piece on three jobs that F1 fans may not know about. These three jobs were held and done by women, but the video didn’t centre on the women; it focused on the jobs.
4. Experimentation in sponsorships. Encourage brands to go beyond visibility and toward value. We are starting to see glimpses of this across multiple motorsport series – including feeder series such as the F1 Academy.
We should be seeing more of the following:
- A tech company sponsoring a year-round mentorship programme pairing aspiring female industry professionals with F1 experts. The likes of Mission 44, the global foundation set up by Sir Lewis Hamilton in 2021, have been driving change in the STEM space by helping raise awareness, host experiences, and open career pathways. There are over one hundred tech sponsors in F1. These sponsors should be setting up mentorship programmes – with the goal of helping diversify these sports.
- A beauty brand funds a behind-the-scenes content series on women in the garage – makeup optional. Or why not sponsor a young up-and-coming driver in one of the feeder series. We’ve seen the incremental momentum from the campaign launched by Charlotte Tilbury in the F1 Academy.
Beyond the novelty, the deal aligns strongly with the mission of F1 Academy to increase female representation in motorsport. The partnership doesn’t just involve branding, it includes grassroots investment, such as free karting sessions for girls in the UK and a scholarship that supports a female racer through an entire season. There is no reason why we can’t have many more such examples.
- A consumer goods brand creates child-friendly trackside areas that empower working mothers to attend.
These aren’t radical ideas. And this is the key point – what most female fans want is to be seen, heard and respected. They want to be able to enjoy the sport they love the same way their male counterparts have been able to for decades. It may look and sound a little different, but the end goal is the same: actively participate in a sport that matters to them.
A blueprint that extends beyond F1
While this piece is rooted in racing, the blueprint has broader resonance. Women’s football is outpacing men’s teams in sponsor ROI. The WNBA is setting the gold standard for player-driven digital content. Baseball teams are rethinking their entire stadium experience through a gender equity lens.
What F1 has is global glamour, generational legacy and untapped intimacy with its fanbase. If it can pivot from seeing female fans as a new market to seeing them as core stakeholders, it could become the blueprint for the next generation of sport. If you want to know where the future of this industry is heading, just look at – or even better, ask – what the young female fans are engaging with, consuming and building.
The conversation around women in F1 is often framed as an issue of inclusion. But inclusion is only the first rung on the ladder. What’s really at stake is transformation of the product, the pipeline and the perception of what sport can be in the 21st century. Women are no longer asking to be invited to the table. They’re building new ones and inviting the sport to pull up a chair.
The teams, series and brands who build for that future – bravely, authentically and collaboratively – won’t just win with women. They’ll win, full stop.
Toni Cowan-Brown is a tech and motorsports commentator examining the crossovers between tech, politics, F1 and internet culture. She co-hosts the Another Podcast and is the founder of cultural platform Sunday Fangirls.
