The start of a New Year for a Formula 1 brings with it excitement, intrigue and controversy, where one unpopular rule is concerned. But a new year also leaves Formula 1 fans in the United Kingdom counting their pennies. More to the point: how many pounds and pence they need to view every Formula 1 race live. The answer to that question appears to be an ever moving barrier. So while the information in this piece is correct as of writing, I cannot guarantee its accuracy in even a week from now. So, how much does Sky Sports F1 cost to view? The answer, is that you are likely going to have to part with at least £50.00 – maybe more. But how much exactly? That answer depends on what you want to watch.

Starting with Sky, the first option is to switch from your current provider to Sky, purchasing the Sports Pack on top of the required Entertainment Pack. The Sports Pack costs £22.00 a month (an increase of £1.00 compared with this time last year), meaning that when you include the compulsory Entertainment Pack, this option will put you back £43.50 a month. Given that 12 months is the minimum subscription (see the small print here), this is £522.00 for the year. Whilst an extremely hefty amount, surprisingly this is only £12.00 higher than the same packages twelve months ago.

One of the cheaper options last year, however has sadly been wiped out. It was possible to just have the HD Pack to watch Sky Sports F1, resulting in a cost of £381.00 a year. This is no longer available. To watch Sky Sports F1 in HD, you now have to have the Entertainment Extra+ Pack, at a cost of £22.00 for six months and then £32.00 per month. Whilst the offer may sound good, the website actually does not explicitly state that this is an offer, so the amount could go up to £32.00 from day one permanently from tomorrow for all I know. Anyway, aside from the Entertainment Extra+ Pack, you need the Sky Sports Pack and the HD Pack. The cost? Across the year, a whopping £651.00 a year. If the Entertainment Extra+ Pack price increased to £32.00 a month, the cost would be £711.00 across the year. And people wonder why Formula 1’s viewing figures are going down? Another one for the paddock journalists out there – lets not put all the blame on Sebastian Vettel, and look at the wider, bigger picture that stretches beyond four tyres on a track.

Moving away from TV, and we move towards viewing Formula 1 via Sky Go’s Monthly Ticket system. Unfortunately, Sky do not offer the Sports Pack on its own, instead like with TV you have to add the Entertainment Pack at a cost of £35.00 a month. The benefit of Sky Go’s Monthly Ticket is that it is simply that – a monthly ticket which you renew, if you wish, every month. With that in mind, the 2014 calendar is as follows:

– March 16th – Australia (Melbourne) – Sky
– March 30th – Malaysia (Sepang) – BBC and Sky
– April 6th – Bahrain (Sakhir) – Sky
– April 20th – China (Shanghai) – Sky
– May 11th – Spain (Barcelona) – BBC and Sky
– May 25th – Monaco (Monaco) – Sky
– June 8th – Canada (Montreal) – BBC and Sky
– June 22nd – Austria (Red Bull Ring) – Sky
– July 6th – Britain (Silverstone) – BBC and Sky
– July 20th – Germany (Hockenheim) – Sky
– July 27th – Hungary (Budapest) – Sky
– August 24th – Belgium (Spa) – BBC and Sky
– September 7th – Italy (Monza) – BBC and Sky
– September 21st – Singapore (Marina Bay) – Sky
– October 5th – Japan (Suzuka) – BBC and Sky
– October 12th – Russia (Sochi) – BBC and Sky
– October 26th – USA (Circuit of the Americas) – Sky
– November 2nd – Brazil (Interlagos) – Sky
– November 16th – Abu Dhabi (Yas Marina) – BBC and Sky

If you want to watch every race live:

– ticket 1 can be used from March 7th to April 7th (Australia and Bahrain)
– ticket 2 can be used from April 15th to May 15th (China)
– ticket 3 can be used from May 22nd to June 22nd (Monaco and Austria)
– ticket 4 can be used from July 1st to August 1st (Germany and Hungary)
– ticket 5 can be used from September 1st to October 1st (Singapore)
– ticket 6 can be used from October 16th to November 16th (USA and Brazil)

Six tickets at £35.00 is £210.00 at most – the same amount as last year, but when you consider the alarming increase of the Sky HD option, this actually works out to be one of the better options. The Now TV online service comes next in the Sky offering. To view the six Sky Sports channels for a 24 hour period, it costs £9.99, identical to last year although I am surprised that they have no reduced the price. I said at the time that it is too steep, and I haven’t changed my thoughts a year on. What this means is that you can watch the ten Sky exclusive races for £99.90. If you want to add Qualifying to that, however, this will increase to £199.80. The final option from Sky comes from their Sky Sports TV service for iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad and Android. It was £4.99 a month. Bad news. It has since doubled, and is now £9.99 a month. Nevertheless, £9.99 multiplied by six tickets means that you arrive at £59.94. If you’re an F1 addict and don’t care about other sports, why pay silly money when you can get away with parting company with only £59.94 for the year?

Over on Virgin Media, their Sky Sports Collection pack is available for £27.25 (up £1.50 a month). Add the TV M+ package with V HD Box on top of that and you are looking at £46.75 a month, or £495.00 a year. There is another option with Virgin Media, and that is the Starter Collection, however there are not any singular options there. Instead it is mostly triple play, so therefore is difficult to compare the prices with any of the other options. Note that Sky Sports F1 is not available to Virgin Media customers in HD.

As of writing, Sky Sports F1 is also not available on BT Vision or Freeview, meaning that the above are the only viable options.

To summarise, if you are a Formula 1 fan:

– £651.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment Extra+, Sports + HD Packs (up £270.00)
– £522.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment + Sports Packs (up £12.00)
– £495.00 a year – Virgin Media TV – V HD Box + M+ + Sky Sports Collection (up £24.00)
– £299.70 – NOW TV – Practice, Qualifying and Race
– £210.00 – Sky Go Monthly Ticket
– £199.80 – NOW TV – Qualifying and Race
– £99.90 – NOW TV – Race
– £59.94 – Sky Sports TV App (up £29.97)

But what if you like two wheels too? You’ve already parted company with several hundred pounds to watch Formula 1 for the year – what now? For those who are fans of both F1 and MotoGP, 2014 will be the most expensive year yet, and the situation does not appear to be changing any time soon. Add the BT Sport options from here (non F1 fans will be interested in reading that link) on top of the Sky and Virgin Media options above. On Sky:

– BT Sport is free if you have BT Broadband
– BT Sport is £12.00 a month if you do not have BT Broadband
– BT Sport HD is an extra £3.00 a month

This means that, for both Formula 1 and MotoGP, there are eight possible combinations.

– £831.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment Extra+, Sports + HD Packs + BT Sport in HD
=> this will get you Formula 1 in HD and MotoGP in HD [if you have no BT Broadband]

– £795.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment Extra+, Sports + HD Packs + BT Sport
=> this will get you Formula 1 in HD and MotoGP in SD [if you have no BT Broadband]

– £702.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment + Sports Packs + BT Sport in HD
=> this will get you Formula 1 in SD and MotoGP in HD [if you have no BT Broadband]

– £687.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment Extra+, Sports + HD Packs + BT Sport in HD
=> this will get you Formula 1 in HD and MotoGP in HD [if you have BT Broadband]

– £666.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment + Sports Packs + BT Sport
=> this will get you Formula 1 in SD and MotoGP in HD [if you have no BT Broadband]

– £651.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment Extra+, Sports + HD Packs + BT Sport
=> this will get you Formula 1 in SD and MotoGP in SD [if you have BT Broadband]

– £558.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment + Sports Packs + BT Sport in HD
=> this will get you Formula 1 in SD and MotoGP in HD [if you have BT Broadband]

– £522.00 a year – Sky TV – Entertainment + Sports Packs + BT Sport in HD
=> this will get you Formula 1 in SD and MotoGP in SD [if you have BT Broadband]

Meanwhile, over on Virgin Media…

– BT Sport is free with the TV XL package
– BT Sport is otherwise £15.00 a month

Which means that it is:

– £675.00 a year – Virgin Media TV – V HD Box + M+ + Sky Sports Collection + BT Sport
=> this will get you Formula 1 in SD and MotoGP in HD

– £633.00 a year – Virgin Media TV – V HD Box + XL + Sky Sports Collection + BT Sport
=> this will get you Formula 1 in SD and MotoGP in HD

A depressing picture and a sad state of affairs, and it also helps show why fans are the real losers here. Other than your traditional television packages, you can do a mix and match for significantly less, for example buying the Sky Sports TV App, along with BT Broadband, thus giving yourself access to the BT Sport app in the process. A final option for MotoGP fans would be to go for their video pass, which works out at about £83.00 based on the current conversion rate. I have never used it, but given the amount of content that is on there, this may be an affordable option for those not wishing to have BT Sport. An F1 equivalent, as of writing, is unavailable.

All prices correct as of Friday 7th February 2014. Information contained in this blog post is subject to change.