- After steady start, IndyCar numbers face a dip from last year’s race at Barber.
- Viewership rebounded last season, fueled by Fox Corporation’s turnaround push.
- The Indianapolis 500 could be the series’s shot at redemption.
The IndyCar Series finds itself back on the clock as viewership numbers wobble, raising fresh questions over its push to grow its audience and draw sponsor interest. The latest stop at Barber Motorsports Park has added more fuel to that fire.
The 2026 Children’s of Alabama Indy Grand Prix drew 906,000 viewers on Fox Corporation, marking a 1 percent dip from last year’s race. The broadcast posted an average of 914,000 viewers, with a peak of 983,000 during Sunday’s event. Alex Palou took the checkered flag, sealing back-to-back wins at the venue on March 30, 2026.
The Barber race became the first of the season to fall short of the 1 million mark. In contrast, the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, the Good Ranchers 250, and the Grand Prix of Arlington each crossed that line, averaging 1.328 million viewers and keeping the early run on track.
IndyCar is now in its second season under a broadcast deal with Fox after moving away from NBC, which carried the series from 2019 to 2024. Unlike its predecessor, Fox has put every race on network television, steering clear of cable and streaming splits. The move came alongside Fox Corporation’s purchase of a one-third stake in Penske Entertainment, tying the broadcaster closer to the sport’s future.
Early surge meets mid-stretch dip
The season began with three race weekends on the trot, each clearing the 1 million mark. Barber, held after a gap week, closed out the March slate as the campaign’s fourth race. The schedule now pauses for the first two weekends of April, which are eaten up by the Final Four and the Masters, before engines fire again at the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach on April 19.
Although there was a dip at the Barber race, the opening stretch delivered numbers not seen since the 2008 unification of open-wheel racing in the United States. For the first time in that span, each of the first three races of a season crossed the 1 million viewer mark on network television.
The high-water mark came at Arlington, where 1,336,000 viewers tuned in despite a weather-forced early start. That figure marked a 142% jump over last year’s third race at Long Beach, which drew 552,000 viewers, and a 54% rise over the average non-Indy 500 Sunday race from last season, which stood at 867,000.
Across the opening trio, Fox’s coverage averaged 1,328,000 viewers, a 48 percent climb from the 895,000 posted over the same stretch in 2025.
Fox’s attempts to redeem the viewership of IndyCar
Fox has gone all in on promotion, using NASCAR Cup Series broadcasts as a launch pad, which even created noticeable tension in NASCAR circles. Teasers, driver interviews, and highlight reels have been interwoven into race coverage to steer viewers toward IndyCar.
At present, IndyCar is the only major racing series in which every event airs on free network television. NASCAR sends a portion of its Cup schedule to network TV, while its O’Reilly Auto Parts Series runs on The CW. Formula 1, on the other hand, has shifted its United States coverage to Apple TV+ streaming, stepping away from linear television.
The current Fox deal remains a long game. IndyCar produces its own broadcasts and operates on modest rights fees, banking on steady gains to drive a richer contract when the present agreement runs its course.
Could the Indy 500 be the swing race?
If history offers a clue, the Indianapolis 500 could yet tilt the scales. The 2025 running drew 7.05 million viewers, the highest in 17 years, with Palou at the front of the field. That figure marked a 40% rise over the 5.024 million who tuned in for the 2024 edition.
The broader trend also points upward. The 2025 IndyCar season averaged 1,362,000 viewers across 17 races, a 27 percent increase from 2024 and the highest season average in 17 years. Among sports drawing at least 1 million viewers, IndyCar posted the largest growth.
Next up, Long Beach returns to the schedule on April 19. The event drew more than 200,000 attendees for its 50th running last year, yet its television numbers lagged. The race’s 552,000 average TV viewership was smaller than that of other IndyCar events last year. The 2024 race, aired on USA Network, drew 307,348 viewers. In 2023, when it aired on NBC, the race pulled in 1.02 million viewers.
Whether Long Beach can climb back to that mark or the series must wait for the Indy 500 to steady the ship remains an open question. For now, IndyCar finds itself walking a tightrope, with early gains in hand but no room to take its foot off the gas.
