About RaceSonar
Formula 1, made followable without a screen — or without sound.
A sighted fan glances at the timing tower and takes in ten facts. RaceSonar gives the same race to someone who cannot see it, cannot hear it, or cannot take in ten things at once: a sentence at a time, chosen so the story comes through.
Who it is for
Three pages, one per audience, each with what the official products leave out and what this app does about it.
By ear
The live timing feed becomes a commentary: overtakes, pit stops, flags, penalties, retirements and the gaps between cars, spoken as they happen. You choose the pace, from only the big moments to everything. Follow one driver and their race comes through louder. Join at half distance and a spoken summary catches you up. It works with the app's own voice or stays silent and lets your screen reader read the captions.
By touch
Every kind of event has a vibration of its own, told apart by count and rhythm: one sharp buzz is an overtake, long-then-short a pit stop, two heavy thuds a retirement, a building ramp the safety car, three long blasts a red flag. On a phone it works in the browser; on a Wear OS watch the patterns use the motor's shaped primitives, and a trackside mode pulses faster as your driver approaches where you stand.
- Overtake
- Pit stop
- Fastest lap
- Retirement
- Safety car
- Red flag
And with captions
Everything spoken is also written: a live caption log, newest first, a running order that updates through the session, team radio as text, and a map of the circuit with every car on it. High-contrast and large-text themes are one switch away, a Calm mode stops everything that moves, and every control works with a keyboard.
Why it exists
Motorsport is a sport of small numbers, a gap of four tenths, a lap two hundredths faster, and every way of watching it assumes you can read them off a screen while a commentator talks over the top. Nobody had built a way to follow a race that starts from what a fan who cannot check the screen needs to hear, or feel, to know what just happened.
RaceSonar is built and run by one person, is free, and takes no advertising. What it needs most is feedback from the people it is for. Write to hello@racesonar.com.
Questions
How can a blind person follow a Formula 1 race?
With RaceSonar, by listening. The live timing feed becomes spoken narration: every overtake, pit stop, flag, penalty and retirement, said as it happens, biggest moments first. It runs in any browser, free, with no account.
How can a deaf person follow a Formula 1 race?
By touch and by text. Each kind of event has its own vibration pattern, captions carry every word at the same moment, and team radio clips are transcribed. It works on a phone in the browser and on a Wear OS watch.
Does it work with VoiceOver, NVDA, JAWS or TalkBack?
Yes. The captions are plain text that any screen reader reads, and the app's own voice switches off when a screen reader is speaking, so nothing is ever said twice. Every control works from the keyboard.
Does it work live?
Yes. Live sessions are narrated as they happen, a few seconds behind the track. A broadcast-sync setting can hold the narration back to line up with your TV, and finished races replay at your own pace.
Which races can I replay?
Every Grand Prix and sprint since the start of 2023, each with a written summary and a full narration from lights out to the flag.
What does it cost?
Nothing. RaceSonar is free while in beta, with no account and no advertising.
Is it affiliated with Formula 1?
No. RaceSonar is an independent accessibility project built on public timing data from OpenF1 and Jolpica/Ergast, with no connection to Formula 1, the FIA or any team.