For the second straight week, NASCAR viewership was slightly down compared to 2025 numbers. However, for the second straight week there were some challenging circumstances that, this time, COTA had to contend with.
According to a report from Adam Stern of the Sports Business Journal, FOX drew 3.933 million viewers for Sunday’s Cup Series race at COTA. That was down about 4.8% from last year’s number of 4.132 million.
It comes on the heels of the race at Atlanta drawing about 2.0% fewer viewers than a year prior. However, as noted, there were some challenging circumstances.
Stern notes that due to the war in the Middle East, cable news TV viewership was up 64% week over week during the race. That likely siphoned some viewers off the FOX broadcast.
The same sort of thing was true for the race at Atlanta a week prior. The FOX NASCAR broadcast window had to compete with the NBC closing ceremonies for the Olympics in the early portions of the Atlanta broadcast, potentially siphoning off some viewers.
The two most recent races might have had slightly declining viewership numbers year over year, but that comes after the Daytona 500 posted a huge viewership number. More on that below.
Daytona 500 crushes the ratings
The 2026 Daytona 500 has come and gone, and FOX released the viewer ratings for the first race of the NASCAR Cup Series season. The race had 7.489 million viewers, an 11% jump from last year (6.761 million).
This year’s Daytona 500 peaked at 9.154 million viewers on FOX from 5:30 – 5:45 p.m. ET. It was also the most-watched Great American Race since 2023 (8.173 million).
NASCAR fans witnessed a wild finish at this year’s Daytona 500. The final lap featured two wrecks, and Tyler Reddick crossed the finish line first despite not leading a single lap during the race.