Apple TV has been the home of Formula 1 in the United States since the start of the 2026 season. Much like the technology giant's approach to MLS (Major League Soccer) and Friday Night Baseball, it's been a modern, very Apple take on the sport.
With extended commentary, original content, and more in addition to race coverage, Apple has aimed to innovate and differentiate the experience from what it formerly was. For starters, if you subscribe to Apple TV in the States, you get it for free. On top of that, there's a clean, modern set of visuals around the action, with several view options, including the ability to customize your own multi-view setup, and, most notably, Dolby Vision support.
Apple wants to up the immersion, though, and is deepening its partnership with Dolby to bring Dolby Atmos to its live broadcast of Formula 1 races, starting with the United States Grand Prix in Austin, Texas. Notably, it doesn't require changing microphones or the existing race-broadcast setup.
Speaking with TechRadar, Jim DeLorenzo, Apple's Global Head of Sports, noted that this innovation had been on the vision board for quite some time. "One of the things that we thought about for quite some time is the audio side of that... how can we get to a point where we have not just Dolby Vision, but Dolby Atmos."
And Apple isn't swapping out the microphones used around the track to make it happen. "We don't change the mic array for this," DeLorenzo told TechRadar. Instead, Apple is working with the existing microphone setup used for the F1 broadcast.
If we can bring a little bit more of this into somebody's viewing experience when they're not at the track, that's going to help connect them a little bit more
Jim DeLorenzo
DeLorenzo said sound is a big part of what makes a live event feel different from watching at home. "Any sporting event, when you're there, one of the things that is so impactful on the experience is the sound," he said. "Because the sound in an F1 race is so visceral... if we can bring a little bit more of this into somebody's viewing experience when they're not at the track, that's going to help connect them a little bit more."
"We are always trying to figure out, how do we break down that barrier a little bit between the people who can go to the event and the people who are watching at home?" DeLorenzo added. "Because the reality is, the vast majority of people are not going to the live sporting event that they're watching, right? They're watching at home. So, we want to try and break that down so people can have that same kind of experience and feel like they're there."
I got to hear a Dolby Atmos mix of some previous races, played as a clip at an event in New York City. Unsurprisingly, it's a night-and-day difference, one that not only adds spatial audio, especially in a room outfitted with a full 9.1.4 setup, but also pulls you into the action. If cars zoom left to right across the screen during a turn, you hear them move that way.
It's similar to the Spatial Audio experience on AirPods Max or Beats 360, but the Dolby Atmos mix is even more impressive for live sport because it pulls you in. You hear the roar and rumble of the engines, the crowd's cheers, and the general atmosphere of the track.
It will never be the same as being in the grandstands or the paddock, but it gives you a better sense of what's happening in a given scene, and you can spot a leading car, or one making a move in a turn ,a bit more quickly. The audio matches the visuals for a more immersive, closer-to-the-stands feel. You can even hear it in the footage I filmed of the engineers switching from the stereo mix to the Dolby Atmos mix.
DeLorenzo says the production team was excited about it: "This one is pretty cool in that it's never been done before with F1," he said. "When you can do something that's never been done before... it raises the bar even more."
Dolby Atmos with Formula 1 broadcasts is a first, but whether that eventually extends to MLS or Friday Night Baseball remains to be seen.
However, judging by other firsts, as with Friday Night Baseball being shot with the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max, and then Apple TV expanding that to MLS, it’s clear that innovations tend to be spread around.
We're trying all kinds of stuff that hasn't shipped yet
Jim DeLorenzo
As for what comes next for Formula 1, Apple isn't saying. "It's still just year one," DeLorenzo noted, and the company is "always trying to see how we innovate and go bigger and make the experience better for fans."
While Apple isn't saying what those next steps might be, DeLorenzo teased that things are already happening behind the scenes. "We're trying all kinds of stuff that hasn't shipped yet, that we hope to ship at some point," he told me.
Might that mean a truly immersive experience fit for Vision Pro, as we’ve seen with select NBA games or Friday Night Baseball? Or maybe it’s mounting an iPhone on a Formula 1 car or at the finish line, or even pulling just the sensor similar to F1 The Movie?
Time will tell, but for now I'm excited to hear them punch it in Dolby Atmos for the United States Grand Prix in Austin come October 22.
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