How to watch the 2024 F1 Bahrain Grand Prix: start time, live stream and TV schedule

Mark your calendar for Saturday: this year’s F1 season starts one day early, so British viewers should clear their schedule from 3pm to watch the 2024 Bahrain Grand Prix live.

The change, made to accommodate the following week’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix (also on Saturday) alongside the start of Ramadan, also shifts he rest of the schedule forward, so the cars will hit the track first on Thursday for two practice sessions, followed by the third practice and qualifying on Friday.

As ever, you can watch or stream all of the action live via subscription, or see the highlights on free-to-view Channel 4.

Qualifying and the race should offer the first concrete indications of whether Red Bull and Max Verstappen‘s dominance will continue for a third year, or if the likes of Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes can mount a challenge to the world champions.

From what we’ve seen, the midfield is set to be more competitive than ever, with Visa Cash App RB looking much stronger than last year, adding to the competition in the form of Stake, Alpine, and possibly Williams. Where Aston Martin will be in all of this, is another question that Bahrain should answer.

F1 live stream and TV schedule 

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How to watch F1: live stream and TV details for 2024 Bahrain Grand Prix

Each minute of every F1 session will be broadcast live in the UK, but for paying subscribers only.

Live TV: All on-track sessions will be broadcast live on Sky Sports F1 starting with Free Practice 1 on Friday at 11.30am. Subscribers also have access to onboard streams from each of the 20 cars, including radio messages, allowing them to follow a favourite driver on their phone while watching the main feed on TV. The onboard streams are also available on TV, as is a ‘Battle Channel’ offering split-screen coverage of the best fights for position.

Live stream: Sky Sports F1 subscribers in the UK can watch all the running live on the Sky Go app. Now TV subscribers can also see live coverage of every session via Sky Sports F1, which also offers additional feeds through the Race Control bonus stream available in the app for monthly subscribers.

Live timings are available through the F1 app.

Highlights: Channel 4 will show highlights of the weekend, with action from Friday’s qualifying session and Saturday’s Grand Prix available to watch later on the respective days of each event.

Bahrain circuit and details

After sixteen hours of pre-season testing, drivers will be well versed with the Bahrain International Circuit by the time they reach qualifying.

At 3.3-miles in length, boasting 15 corners and three DRS zones, the track has a wide variety of low, medium and high-speed corners and provides plenty of overtaking opportunities — often making for some nail-biting races.

In 2022, Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc battled wheel-to-wheel for consecutive laps through sector 1 — jostling for an advantage ahead of the second DRS zone which presents a consistent overtaking opportunity at Turn 4. Leclerc ultimately hung onto the lead while Verstappen suffered a last-gasp problem with his battery, leaving him to coast into the pitlane.

Team-mate Sergio Perez suffered a similar fate on the final lap, as he was defending a podium-place against Lewis Hamilton at Turn 1 — which can be another prominent place to force an overtake.

Due to the amount of practice teams have had in Bahrain in the lead up to the first race of the season, each will have been able to hone their set-up for the track, which can exaggerate any clear advantages. This has led to convincing victories in the past.

Should Red Bull’s RB20 be an improvement on its predecessor while the trailing field continues to lag behind, the 2024 Bahrain Grand Prix could run very similarly to last year’s race, in which Verstappen won by a landslide margin — with the nearest non-Red Bull finishing 38 seconds behind him. We can only hope the likes of Ferrari, Mercedes and McLaren have made a significant jump since then.

No rain is expected throughout the race weekend and temperatures during qualifying and race day are set to be an average of 21°C.

F2 opener

Boasting one of the most talented grids in recent memory, the 2024 F2 season will alongside F1 this weekend in Bahrain.

The majority of eyes will be glued on Prema, with returning F2 star Ollie Bearman and rising sensation Kimi Antonelli in the cockpits. Both drivers could be in title contention from the get-go alongside 2023 F2 race winner Victor Martins, but the Prema pair are widely tipped to be the drivers in contention for F1 seats from 2025 onwards.

As a member of the Mercedes junior programme, Antonelli has been linked with a seat next to George Russell after Lewis Hamilton announced his departure to Ferrari during the winter break. His initial performances in F2 will answer many questions asked about the Italian’s readiness to make the jump — but he’s still widely regarded as the best F3 driver since Max Verstappen, with multiple championships to back up such a claim.

As a member of the Ferrari junior programme, Bearman is equally in the running for the free seats which will be opening up at the end of this season. Maranello customer teams Haas or Sauber are possibly his most plausible options.

2024 Bahrain Grand Prix full session times

All times in GMT