The European Broadcasting Union (EBU), Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO) and Unipublic have extended their cycling broadcast agreement by two years to 2032. Under the deal, the men's and women's Tours de France, Vueltas and spring classics will keep appearing on public-service television across much of Europe, with Eurosport and TNT Sports continuing to hold pay-TV rights.
The EBU is an alliance of public-service broadcasters, rather than a television channel itself. In cycling, it negotiates rights agreements with organisers that give participating member broadcasters access to a shared package of races, while also sublicensing coverage to Eurosport. For fans, it keeps all or part of the package available free to air in participating countries, alongside paid coverage, rather than leaving those races solely behind a subscription.
The deal at a glance:
- What has changed? Two extra years of coverage, adding 2031 and 2032 to the existing agreement.
- What stays free? Participating EBU broadcasters in 11 countries will show all or part of the race package, not necessarily every race.
- Where does pay-TV fit? Eurosport continues through a sublicence, permission from the EBU to broadcast the races, with TNT Sports named for Britain and Ireland. France has a separate territorial restriction.
- What about free UK and Irish coverage? It rests on separate deals, none of which currently runs into 2031.
The extension, announced on October 19, covers 2031 and 2032. It adds to the 2026–2030 agreement announced in October 2024 and keeps the same race package. That package includes 13 men's races: the Tour de France, La Vuelta, Paris-Roubaix, Liège-Bastogne-Liège, La Flèche Wallonne, Paris-Nice, the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, the ADAC Cyclassics Hamburg, Eschborn-Frankfurt, the Clásica San Sebastián, Paris-Tours, Tro Bro Leon and the Volta a Catalunya. The five women's races are the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift, La Vuelta Femenina, Paris-Roubaix Femmes, Liège-Bastogne-Liège Femmes and La Flèche Wallonne Femmes.
The EBU named 11 member broadcasters that will show the races free to air in 2031 and 2032. The agreement commits them to "all or part" of the package, so a broadcaster on the list will not necessarily carry every race.
Free-to-air broadcasters for 2031–2032
EBU members showing all or part of the ASO and Unipublic race package, as named when the extension was signed
Country | Broadcaster |
|---|---|
| Belgium | RTBF |
| Czechia | CT |
| Denmark | TV2 |
| Hungary | DUNA |
| Italy | RAI |
| Netherlands | NOS |
| Norway | TV2 |
| Portugal | RTP |
| Slovakia | RTVS |
| Slovenia | RTV |
| Switzerland | SRG SSR |
The list reflects the broadcasters taking part on the day the extension was signed. It is shorter than the one published with the 2026–2030 agreement, which named 13 free-to-air territories, including Luxembourg and Spain. Neither appears among the 11 for 2031 and 2032, even though Spain is home to Unipublic and the Vuelta.
Eurosport will continue to show the Tour, the Vuelta and the rest of the package across Europe through a sublicence from the EBU. France is excluded from that sublicence, with six exceptions: La Vuelta, La Vuelta Femenina, the Volta a Catalunya, the Clásica San Sebastián, the Cyclassics Hamburg and Eschborn-Frankfurt. French viewers will therefore not see Eurosport coverage of the Tour, Paris-Roubaix or the Ardennes classics under this agreement.
ASO's director of media and partnerships, Julien Goupil, said nearly 150 million people across the continent follow the Tour each summer. That figure measures anyone who watched at least one minute of live television coverage. Goupil said the joint approach with the EBU had "enabled us to reach new audiences and also to make our audiences younger", and that ASO and EBU members wanted to move more viewing onto broadcasters' own digital platforms. "This transition is already well under way," he said.
Frédéric Sanz, the EBU's head of summer sports and cycling, said the package carried an equal commitment to men's and women's racing. ASO dates its first overall agreement with the European broadcasters' group, then called Eurovision, to 1968.
Britain and Ireland
TNT Sports is named alongside Eurosport for the United Kingdom and Ireland, and neither country has an EBU free-to-air partner on the list. Free coverage in both markets depends on separate arrangements, and none of those announced so far extends to 2031.
In the UK, a deal between Channel 5 and TNT Sports announced in June brought daily free highlights of the men's Tour and Vuelta back to terrestrial television for 2026 to 2028, following ITV's departure. The same deal covers the Giro d'Italia from 2027 to 2029. It also includes live coverage of the British Grand Départs of both the men's and women's Tours in 2027, plus daily highlights of the 2027 Tour de France Femmes. Channel 5's Tour highlights averaged 557,400 viewers per stage in 2026. Live coverage of every stage remained on TNT Sports and HBO Max, which require a subscription.
S4C took a sublicence from TNT Sports to show seven live stages in Welsh in 2026, along with highlights throughout the race. The broadcaster said in June that talks for 2027 were under way.
The 2026 women's Tour had neither Channel 5 highlights nor S4C live stages. UK viewers needed TNT Sports or HBO Max to watch it live, and the only free option was short highlights on official YouTube channels.
In Ireland, TG4 said in June that it had extended its Tour de France rights to 2030. Its coverage shows every stage live in Irish across the TG4 channel, TG4 Player and the TG4 app. TNT Sports is not available on HBO Max in Ireland, so Irish viewers who want it must subscribe through local television providers.
