How & Where to Watch Pro Cycling in 2025
Breaking down exactly where you can watch every major pro bike race in 2025 & how much it is going to cost
With the start of the 2025 WorldTour cycling season growing closer as we approach the Tour Down Under, which kicks off on January 21st, I wanted to send the BTP readers into the 2025 road season with at least some sort of guide about 1) where they can (legally) find bike races in the United States (since it is the largest readership market of this newsletter) and 2) help people understand which streaming services they need to purchase, or let go, to watch the races they most want to see.
While one might imagine this to be an easy, straightforward project, outside of being expensive, attempting to (legally) watch cycling in the United States is incredibly confusing since it is not easy to figure out exactly which races are featured on which streaming service.
Unlike mainstream sports, where networks and streaming services announce their acquisition of television rights in press releases and quickly codify the information, the broadcast rights for professional cycling live in a semi-mysterious netherworld, making it extremely difficult to know where each race is being broadcast.
This is likely at least partially a tactic that allows all three US-based streaming services to advertise that they offer cycling while not fully admitting that they each offer only a small slice of the calendar and, for all except Peacock, that they don’t offer the Tour de France.
A particularly bad offender of this tactic is FloBikes, which will show all races they offer in Canada, but not explicitly show that they aren’t available in all markets.
For example, a casual browser might see this schedule on FloBikes’ website and assume you will be able to watch the Tour de France if you purchase the service.
But, if you are in the United States and actually click on the event, it displays a small red banner with the text “This event is unavailable in your area”
So, Who Actually Offers What?
To help my readers navigate this confusion, I have included my deeply researched best-guess guide below for where USA-based viewers can find each race.
A good rule of thumb for every other race not included is that every ASO-owned race is broadcast on Peacock, every Flanders Classic race is on FloBikes, and RCS races, plus everything else, are on Max.
What Is This Going to Cost Me?
As you can see above, frustratingly, US cycling fans need three separate streaming services to view the entire 2025 WorldTour road calendar, with an all-in annual cost of $350.
Cost of 2025 USA Streaming Cycling Services (with ads)
Max: $119.88 per year ($251.88 ad-free)
FloBikes: $149.99 per year
Peacock: $79.99 per year ($139.99 ad-free)Annual (with ads) Total: $349.86
Annual total for ad packages: $541.86
One thing to keep in mind is that while WBD currently offers its B/R Sports tier (the service that allows you to view live sports) for free with a subscription to the Max service, it is possible that it will eventually return to its original plan of charging an additional $9.99 per month for that tier.
Can’t I Watch This All for Free?
While you can, at least theoretically, access pirated streams of races to avoid dealing with any of the above confusion and financial burden, I have grown somewhat opposed to consistently relying on illegal streams in recent years.
Outside of any ethical, legal, or digital hygiene issues, if you plan to watch a significant portion of the calendar or even just the biggest races, the low quality of the streams and the fact that they are consistently bogged down by traffic surges or taken down completely in the final few kilometers of major races will slowly but surely drive you insane, and leave you searching for more reliable broadcast sources.
Potential VPN Workarounds to Save Money
Nevertheless, there are two fairly easy ways to lower costs while accessing high-quality video feeds.
With Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. (WBD) discontinuing its various international streaming platforms (e.g., Eurosport Player, Discovery +) and migrating its entire global streaming market to the Max platform, it is technically possible to create a Max account in a country like France, where it airs nearly the entire racing calendar, and use a VPN to set your location in France while accessing the app.
However, one big issue with this plan is that you need to use a payment method originating from the country where the account is being created.
Thus, your US-based credit cards, PayPal, Apple Pay, etc. won’t work, and you will need to either open a local bank account or buy a prepaid charge card in the country where you want to create an account.
A far more straightforward hack is to purchase the FloBikes annual subscription along with a quality VPN service. This way, you can use that VPN to watch the entire racing season from the FloBikes app by virtually switching your location to Canada when races are blacked out in the US.
This is a particularly good option if you want to access the World Feed commentary that was previously offered on Peacock but has recently been removed.
With the pro cycling viewing situation being fairly complex and ever-evolving, please refer to the BTP chat (linked below) if you have any questions or tips or just want to share your predictions for the season.
This list is super helpful. Thanks.
Something to be aware of when it comes to using FloBikes: in the past they have been notoriously bad at avoiding spoilers of race results. For example, if you log in to watch a race that has finished, they will often show something on either their homepage or the page for the specific race that indicates who won, and it's very difficult to find the recording of the race without inadvertently seeing the results. That may have changed, but as of last season, it was still a problem.