F1 Academy opens its 2026 season this weekend in Shanghai — running alongside the Chinese Grand Prix. Eighteen drivers. Six teams. And a sponsor grid that tells a more interesting commercial story than most people realise.
Ten of the eleven F1 teams have placed their liveries on F1 Academy cars. The one holdout — Cadillac — joins in 2027. But the more revealing entries are the non-F1 sponsors: Sephora, LEGO, Gatorade, American Express, TAG Heuer, and Puma are all buying into a series that didn't exist three years ago.
F1 Academy is three years old and already has Sephora, LEGO, American Express, and Gatorade on its grid. These are not charity sponsorships. They are calculated entries into a series broadcast across 170+ territories, with a YouTube audience that grew 67% year-over-year in 2025, and where 3 out of every 4 new F1 fans in 2025 were female.
The series functions as a low-cost sponsorship laboratory for brands that cannot afford — or do not need — the full F1 grid. A title sponsorship on an F1 Academy car costs a fraction of a Formula 1 team deal, but activates inside the same race weekend, the same paddock, and the same broadcast window. For Sephora, LEGO, and American Express, the ROI calculation is straightforward: access the F1 audience demographic they actually want, at the price point that makes commercial sense.
Cadillac is the only F1 team without a presence in 2026 — but they join in 2027. When all 11 F1 teams are represented, the series will have completed its commercial infrastructure. What happens to the non-F1 brand sponsors at that point is the more interesting question.
- F1 Academy Official — 2026 Drivers & Teams
- Wikipedia — 2026 F1 Academy Season
- Formula1.com — Sephora Becomes Official Partner of F1 Academy, March 2026
- Sephora Newsroom — F1 Academy Partnership Launch
- F1 Academy — Full F1 Team Support Multi-Year Partnership
- Formula Scout — 2026 F1 Academy Season Preview
- Glossy — Sephora Announces Partnership with F1 Academy (Celessa Baker interview)
