No subtitles, no service: Formula 1's Accessibility DNF

🏎️💨 Please forgive me for the terrible puns, I will box them for now. Anyway…

As Formula 1 continues to expand its global audience and invest in premium viewing experiences, one significant portion of the fanbase remains left in the pit lane: deaf and hard of hearing viewers.

Despite F1's claims of commitment to accessibility, the reality for many fans like myself tells a different story - one of exclusion, frustration, and being forced to miss crucial content that hearing fans take for granted. I’ve personally observed this oversight for years, foolishly hoping it would be fixed the following year… or the year after that…

However, with the current 2025 Season also bringing a new tier to F1TV where they mildly downgraded the "Pro" tier, and added a "Premium" tier that included sweet, juicy 4K goodness and HDR... and yet, their entire library remains inaccessible.

At the annual price of $129.99, it was time for me to draw the line.

The Problem: Widespread Subtitle Failures Across F1TV's Content Library

F1TV offers an extensive library of content beyond just race broadcasts - documentaries, technical analysis, historical features, and behind-the-scenes content that enriches the F1 experience. However, this content remains largely inaccessible to Deaf and hard of hearing viewers due to persistent subtitle issues across multiple platforms.

My documentation reveals a systematic failure, not just isolated incidents:

Issue 1: Non-functional Subtitle Options

On Safari browsers, many F1TV shows display a subtitle/CC option that, when clicked, only shows "unknown" for language options. Even when selected, no subtitles appear on screen.

Screenshot from "Greatest Comebacks" showing the non-functional subtitle option in Safari*.*

Issue 2: Missing Subtitle Controls Entirely

When viewing identical content on Firefox browsers, the subtitle option often disappears completely. The settings menu (gear icon) only displays resolution options with no caption controls available.

Screenshot from "Tech Talk Retro" showing the complete absence of subtitle options in Firefox*.*

Issue 3: Broken Closed Captioning on Mobile Apps

The F1TV app on iPadOS displays a "CC" button suggesting closed captions are available, yet selecting this option fails to display any captions on screen.

Screenshot from "Racing ID" showing the CC button that doesn't produce any actual captions on iPadOS*.*

The Impact: Premium Prices, Subpar Accessibility

The accessibility failures become even more frustrating when considering F1TV's current pricing structure in 2025.

The new 4K premium tier, despite commanding a higher subscription fee, still fails to provide adequate captioning. Their live races do have closed captioning, but it’s provided at the bare minimum level.

These are the pain points:

• Post-race driver interviews inexplicably lose captions mid-segment

• Driver cooldown room footage remains uncaptioned

• The entire content library of documentaries, analysis shows, and technical features lacks functional subtitles

• Team radios are subtitled about 25% of the time

What's particularly insulting is that ESPN's Formula 1 coverage (available on YouTube TV, which I also pay for) manages to provide consistent closed captioning for every minute of the Formula 1 segments, including driver interviews, cooldown room, etc. - proving this isn't a technical impossibility but rather a priority issue for F1TV.

If I already pay for YouTube TV, which includes ESPN’s fully captioned F1 coverage, then F1TV provides no additional value for Deaf fans—except for its broken library. Why should we pay a premium for less accessibility?

More Examples: The Shows on F1TV That Lack Captioning

Earlier in this post, I had shown screenshots that demonstrate the "states" of closed captioning: unknown, broken, or just plain missing.

This part of my documentation highlights how this problem affects a range of content series and is not isolated to one series or platform:

Beyond All Limits (Documentaries)

☝🏻Viewed on Firefox

☝🏻Viewed on iPad Pro (Official F1TV app)

☝🏻Viewed on Safari

Jolyon Palmer’s Technical Analysis

☝🏻Viewed on Firefox

☝🏻Viewed on iPad Pro (Official F1TV app)

☝🏻Viewed on Safari

Tech Talk Retro

☝🏻Viewed on Firefox

☝🏻Viewed on iPad Pro (Official F1TV app)

☝🏻Viewed on Safari

There are several more examples, I simply chose the most popular ones to demonstrate. Feel free to verify this for yourself in the F1TV App Library!

Video demonstration

For those who want to see these issues in action, I've created a video demonstration showing the subtitle failures on multiple shows on my YouTube channel here:

F1TV Subtitle Issue Demonstration 👈

Live races

While the live races do indeed have closed captioning, it doesn’t cover every segment like driver cooldown rooms, or post-race interviews with the three podium winners, but one of my gripes is the lack of accessibility for these scintillating team radio messages!

An AWS blog post from 2021 reveals that F1TV already uses Amazon Transcribe to generate live captions in English, Spanish, and French—customized for F1-specific terminology. So why hasn’t this technology been extended to their entire content library?

I’ve noticed that they elect to subtitle 25% of the team radios during most races - I’m sure you understand what I mean by observing the two examples below.

Screenshot from Formula 1 2025 - Australian GP, showing the McLaren team radio indicator and audio bar levels, not producing any subtitles underneath like they seldom do.

Screenshot from Formula 1 2025 - Australian GP, showing the Red Bull team radio with included subtitles below it. This is the way!

Before anyone jumps to the assumption that team radios are too difficult to transcribe on the fly, do consider this wonderful project utilized by the MultiViewer app, which in my opinion is far more accessible with a wealth of AI-powered transcriptions than F1TV itself. In my opinion, MultiViewer has moved mountains, while F1TV has barely shifted pebbles.

I always found it tiring how I have to pay for F1TV in order for their API to be accessible by MultiViewer, a completely free and crowdfunded app - which was also found to be used extensively by the F1 media stations behind the scenes - just so that I can use MultiViewer and its’ accessible tools.

I always figured Formula 1 would pay attention to the success of MultiViewer and perhaps implement some of these features into their own proprietary app… and they did, at least just with the “multiview” feature for now — but they ignored the AI transcriptions. They could have used AWS services for this, too.

What F1 Needs to Fix

1. Implement consistent subtitles across ALL content - not just live races, but their shows and movies

2. Ensure subtitle functionality works across all platforms (browsers, TV apps, mobile apps)

3. Maintain caption continuity during interviews and cooldown room footage

4. Provide transparent support channels to open a channel for reporting accessibility issues

5. Match the accessibility standards already achieved by broadcast partners like ESPN

The Bigger Picture: Accessibility as a Right, Not a Luxury

Formula 1 proudly positions itself as a global, inclusive sport that embraces diversity. Yet its digital content strategy tells a different story - one where Deaf and hard of hearing fans are treated as an afterthought. The inconsistent implementation of basic accessibility features across F1TV suggests accessibility is viewed as optional rather than fundamental.

For Deaf F1 fans like myself, these aren't minor inconveniences - they represent significant barriers to fully enjoying and understanding a sport we love. When we pay premium subscription prices, we deserve equal access to all content, not just portions deemed worthy of accessibility features.

While Formula 1 is a global company with fans from all kinds of countries, they are rooted heavily in their original British roots, which makes me wonder how they view accessibility in the UK as opposed to how we do in the United States with our ADA laws and higher expectations for accessibility. Formula 1 is owned by Liberty Media, an U.S. based company, but their TV operations (Formula One Management) is based in the UK. It’s possible that transatlantic overlap led to muddled policies, making accessibility more of an afterthought than a priority.

A Call to Action

If F1 truly values its entire fanbase, it must:

• Acknowledge these systematic accessibility failures

• Commit to a transparent timeline for implementing comprehensive subtitles

• Involve Deaf and hard of hearing fans in testing and feedback

• Establish dedicated accessibility support channels

• Make accessibility a core requirement for all content, not an afterthought

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If F1TV wants to justify charging ($84.99/$129.99) per year for a (pro/premium) experience, then accessibility should be a standard feature, not a luxury. Until they address these failures, they’re effectively charging Deaf and hard-of-hearing fans more money for less access—excluding us from the full F1 experience despite our passionate support of the sport.

Have you experienced similar issues with F1TV accessibility? Share your experiences in the comments below or reach out to me directly. 🏎️💨