SailGP Caps Fifth Season with Record $230 Million Economic Impact and Audience Growth

SailGP has concluded its 2025 season with a major inflection point, achieving record audience numbers, significant commercial growth, and scaled global operations that drove over USD230 million in regional economic impact across its championship calendar.

The global racing championship’s success is highlighted by surpassing all initial major targets set in 2019, including doubling its events and teams while achieving a 12x increase in annual audience and a 20x increase in revenue since Season One.

Confirming the successful execution of the league’s strategic program, managing director of SailGP, Andrew Thompson, said: “The 2025 Season has reinforced SailGP’s position as a global leader in sport and entertainment, with record audiences and world-class racing bringing our championship to new heights.”

The league plans further scale for the next years, beginning with a record 13 nations, including new entry Artemis Racing (Sweden), set to join the startline for the 2026 season.

The 2025 season featured a record 12 Grand Prix events, expanding to four new venues including Portsmouth, Sassnitz, Geneva, and Auckland.

The competitive field also reached a record high of 12 teams, adding new entries from Red Bull Italy and Mubadala Brazil, the league’s first South American entry, which also featured SailGP’s first female driver, two-time Olympic champion Martine Grael.

Financially, the league has cemented its value. Team valuations now exceed USD60 million, supported by new high-profile investors.

Furthermore, the league secured pivotal global partnerships, naming Rolex as the new title partner and signing multi-season global league deals with DP World, Emirates, Accor, KPMG, and Fever.

In an infrastructural move, SailGP invested USD10 million into SailGP Technologies in Southampton, UK, to serve as its global headquarters for design, manufacturing, and innovation.

The dedicated broadcast audience averaged 18 million viewers per event, with single-event viewership records broken twice.

Notably, the U.S. broadcast of the Race to Abu Dhabi on CBS reached 3.469 million live linear viewers, setting a new record for the most-watched sailing race in U.S. history.

Digitally, total social views skyrocketed past 1.65 billion—a 90 per cent increase from Season Four—with total followers reaching 2.7 million. On-site attendance also peaked, drawing more than 112,000 ticketed spectators, including 25,000 in Auckland and 20,000 in Portsmouth.

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