A rare win for Netflix as F1 boss credits it with making the sport popular

News
By
published
F1 Cars In Las Vegas
F1 Cars In Las Vegas (Image credit: Formula 1)

What you need to know

  • Christian Horner believes that Netflix is to thank for F1's rise in popularity.
  • F1 is the subject of four Drive to Survive seasons that are available on Netflix.

Beleaguered Netflix has a rare win to celebrate and it's come from an unlikely place — Red Bull Formula 1 Team Principal Christian Horner.

Horner was speaking to Bloomberg about Formula 1's current moment in the sun — growing popularity that Horner believes is thanks, at least in part, to Netflix. F1 is the subject of Netflix series Drive to Survive and has already seen four series grow the sport's popularity in new ways — specifically, it's helped the sport take a foothold in the American market. Historically, F1 hasn't been popular stateside, but that's all changing.

Amid news that Netflix lost 200,000 subscribers earlier this year the company has been seeking ways to cut costs and make more money. The first has been done by culling a number of animation projects that were in the works, while the second involves cutting password sharers off and planning a new ad-supported payment tier. But, as ever, it's the content that really matters — and in Drive to Survive both Netflix and F1 have found a symbiotic relationship that works.

You can now watch the first four seasons of Drive to Survive on Netflix and they're well worth watching even if you wouldn't consider yourself a huge F1 fan. In fact, the season has no doubt been responsible for plenty of non-fans getting involved in the sport for the first time, as Horner suggests.

If you want to enjoy Drive to Survive in style, be sure to check out our list of the best Apple TV deals on the market today.

Oliver Haslam
Oliver Haslam
Contributor

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.