F1 live stream: Watch Formula 1 online for free

Looking to watch Formula 1 racing online? You’ve got a few streaming options, and with the 74th World Championship officially underway, now’s the time to find a service that will let you enjoy the Spanish Grand Prix live stream and the rest of the F1 races for the 2023 season. Whether you’re planning to watch the action unfold on a smart TV or streaming stick or you want to be able to catch every lap on your laptop or mobile device when you’re on the go, we’ve got everything you need to know right here. Read on to learn how to watch Formula 1 online, how much it will cost you, and whether there’s a free F1 live stream (spoiler: there is, but there’s a catch). We’ve also got a full Grand Prix schedule, so you can see what you can look forward to during the 74th F1 World Championship.

Watch the free F1 live stream

The 274th F1 World Championship is being aired for free in Austria and Luxembourg. This is great news for those in the countries, but not so great for residents traveling abroad who want to watch the action unfold live in their local language — especially when it’s free to watch at home. It’s only fitting that an Austrian currently in the United States would want to watch the race in Austrian and not English, right? This is completely safe (and legal) to do with a VPN.

Just install it, choose the location you wish to connect to, then fire up broadcast. The free streams are ORF in Austria or RTL Zwee in Luxembourg.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a free F1 live stream for residents of other countries. Elsewhere, folks will need to tune in through a local broadcast partner. The races are all available on ESPN in the United States, and the best way to tune in is on ESPN through fuboTV, which offers a one-week free trial to new customers, so you can watch the Spanish Grand Prix for free if it’s your first time taking the service for a spin.  There are some other options available as well —  we’ll touch on those below.

Watch the F1 live stream on FuboTV

If you’re a fan of Formula 1 racing as well as other sports and you’re looking for a live TV streaming package that lets you watch F1 live streams online, then you should definitely consider FuboTV. FuboTV is a popular sports-focused streaming service that provides access to more than 140 live TV channels including ESPN. FuboTV offers a few different plans with subscriptions starting at $75 per month for the standard Pro package.

Upgraded packages add more channels to the live TV lineup along with extras like 4K viewing. All plans include ESPN, allowing you to watch F1 live streams online, while the many other sports channels let you enjoy the NFL, NBA, Major League Baseball, and much more. You can also have up to 10 simultaneous streams going. That’s the most generous allowance of all of these live TV streaming services, so FuboTV is a good choice for families and other households where you frequently have several people streaming at the same time.

Once you’ve signed up, you can download the FuboTV app and watch Formula 1 racing on a range of devices including smartphones, tablets, smart TVs, streaming sticks, and Xbox gaming consoles. Simply FuboTV on your device (or open it in a web browser if you don’t want to deal with installing app), navigate to the ESPN channel, and start streaming. Whether you’re a die-hard F1 fan or a casual viewer, watching Formula 1 racing on ESPN via FuboTV is a great way to experience the thrill of every lap.

Watch the F1 live stream on Hulu with Live TV

Our recommendation for those looking for the best way to watch F1 live streams (and the best bang for your buck if you’re looking for a comprehensive online streaming package) is Hulu with Live TV. A basic Hulu subscription gives you access to an extensive library of Hulu original series along with tons of shows and movies, but along with letting you stream the best shows on Hulu, the Live TV subscription adds more than 85 television channels to the mix.

That channel lineup includes ESPN, meaning that Hulu with Live TV is a great way to watch F1 live streams for all of the Grands Prix. This also means you can enjoy live sports like NCAA and NBA basketball, NHL hockey, NFL football, English Premier League soccer, and much more. Other live channels include ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, and CNN, which gives you plenty of additional live content, from news and entertainment to events like the Academy Awards.

But what really sets Hulu with Live TV apart from the other streaming packages we’re going to mention is that it comes bundled with Disney+ and ESPN+. This is a recent development; previously, you could sign up for Hulu with Live TV for $65 and then add Disney+ and ESPN+ for an extra charge. Now, Hulu with Live TV costs $70 per month, but since it includes Disney+ and ESPN+, you’re basically getting both of those services for only $5 per month. We feel that this is more than worth it considering how much content you get.

Disney+ gives you access to a large and growing catalog of movies and original series, from Disney and Pixar productions to everything under the Marvel and Star Wars umbrellas (since these IPs are now owned by Disney). That alone gives you a ton of entertainment to enjoy. You can stream classic and new movies on Disney+ as well as exclusive shows on Disney+ like The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett, plus Marvel content like The Avengers films.

ESPN+ rounds out the deal and is a must-have for sports lovers and especially fans of MMA, as it’s the best way to stream UFC fights and the only way to watch live UFC pay-per-view events. Combined with all the other sports content you get with Hulu’s Live TV channels, ESPN+ gives sports fans pretty much everything they could want from a streaming bundle. Your Hulu with Live TV subscription lets you watch on two screens simultaneously and gives you cloud DVR so you can download live programming and watch it offline when needed. HBO, Cinemax, Showtime, and Starz are also available as premium add-ons.

Watch the F1 live stream on Sling TV

Looking for what might be the cheapest way to watch any F1 live stream online? Sling TV is a fantastic and flexible high-value streaming package if you only want the essentials and don’t care to pay for a bunch of channels you’ll never watch. Sling TV offers three plans (or really, two plans that you can optionally combine into one): Sling Blue, Sling Orange, and Sling Orange & Blue. For watching sports and F1 live streams, you want the Sling Orange tier, as this includes three ESPN channels. Sling Orange features 30+ channels in total and costs $40 per month. Your Orange subscription allows for one device stream — a bit basic, but this is by far the cheapest streaming service on our list. You also get 50 hours of cloud DVR recording for watching offline.

Sling Blue also costs $35 per month, but includes 42 channels and allows for three simultaneous users. The Blue tier doesn’t have ESPN, however. But if you combine it with the Orange plan, then you’ll get more than 40 channels including three ESPN channels. The Sling Orange & Blue plan is a great all-in-one package, and you can get that for $55 per month (only $15 more than the Orange or Blue plans by themselves). That’s still a good value if you want a more streamlined TV streaming package and one that allows you to watch F1 live streams online.

A handful of channels that come with all three Sling plans include AMC, CNN, Cartoon Network, Comedy Central, The Food Network, HGTV, TNT, and The History Channel. Note that if you opt for the Orange package, you’ll get ESPN but will be missing out on other sports channels including NBC, the NFL Network, and Fox Sports, as well as other channels like TLC, USA, Syfy, MSNBC, and National Geographic. For our money, it’s worth upgrading to Sling Orange + Blue. That also allows you to have three device streams going simultaneously, whereas the basic Orange plan only allows for one viewer at a time.

It’s worth noting that, as of now, HBO and Cinemax are not available as premium add-ons with Sling, although Starz, Showtime, and some others are. This might change in the future. After signing up, you can install Sling on most popular smart TVs, streaming sticks, mobile devices, and Xbox Series X/S gaming consoles (PlayStation is not currently supported, unfortunately). You can also watch F1 live streams using Sling TV right in your computer’s web browser — no app required.

Watch the F1 live stream on YouTube TV

Another great option for watching any F1 live stream online is YouTube TV. Most people know YouTube as a website for watching videos (and in recent years, live streams as well), but the Google-owned platform now offers a TV subscription package that’s similar to services like Hulu with Live TV and Sling. For $65 per month, YouTube TV delivers more than 100 channels offering live and on-demand content including news, sports, and shows. That’s more channels than Hulu with Live TV or Sling, so if you’re looking for the largest TV streaming package that includes ESPN and you don’t care about extras like Disney+ or ESPN+, YouTube TV might be your best bet.

Live channels that you get with YouTube TV include ESPN, AMC, The Food Network, TNT, CNN, NBC, FOX, Comedy Central, and many more — and with ESPN, YouTube TV lets you follow all the intense high-speed action of F1 live streams as they happen. If you like other sports, then dedicated networks for NFL, NBA, and MLB games are there for you to enjoy, too. You can also add premium channels like HBO, Cinemax, Showtime, and Starz to your plan at extra cost if you want. Ultra HD 4K streaming capability is available as another premium add-on as well.

One of the best things about YouTube TV is its ease of use and broad compatibility with streaming devices. You can watch YouTube TV on your computer, smart TV, streaming stick, mobile device, or even your Xbox or PlayStation gaming console. Your subscription also includes unlimited DVR cloud recording and playback, which is better than Hulu and Sling (both of which impose limits on how much you can download and store on the cloud DVR). All in all, YouTube TV is a great cord-cutting solution for the price and a great service for watching F1 live streams if channel selection, cloud DVR capabilities, and ease of use are your priorities.

Formula 1 2023 schedule

Formula 1 racing seasons follow a pretty standard schedule, starting early in the year and closing out in the final months. The 2023 F1 season is the 74th Formula 1 World Championship and is also one of the largest, with 23 Grands Prix taking place worldwide. The number of Grands Prix are held per season has fluctuated over the decades, increasing steadily as time passed (there were no more than 11 races per season in the sport’s first few decades).

The 2021 F1 season was the first to feature 22 Grands Prix, and 2022 followed suit. The 2023 season is even bigger and began with the Bahrain Grand Prix at the Bahrain International Circuit on March 5. The championship tour will culminate with the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix at the Yas Marina Circuit in the United Arab Emirates eight months later on November 26. Ten teams have entered, with auto constructors including MacLaren, Ferrari, Alfa Romeo, Mercedes, and Aston Martin. F1 follows a points-based system where drivers score by placing in races, and each team will of course be gunning hard for the coveted Formula 1 World Championship.

The current Formula 1 champion is 25-year-old racer Max Verstappen, the son of retired F1 driver Jos Verstappen. Although born in Belgium, Max Verstappen spent much of his youth in the Netherlands and considers himself Dutch. He made his Formula 1 debut in 2015 at the Australian Grand Prix, where, at the age of 17, he became the youngest F1 driver to ever compete in the sport. He later joined the Red Bull Racing team, and driving under the Dutch flag, he won the 2016 Spanish Grand Prix to become the youngest and first Dutch driver to win an F1 Grand Prix.

Verstappen continued his impressive run into 2021 and 2022, clinching the Formula 1 World Championship in both seasons. Following his 2021 victory, he became the 34th Formula One World Drivers’ Champion and set yet another record as the first Dutch Formula 1 World Championship winner. With 37 victories, 22 pole positions, and now two F1 World Championships to his name, Max Verstappen is the defending champ and the one to beat this year, currently at the top of the 2023 standings. Sergio Pérez, also racing for team Red Bull, stands in second place.

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