The 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season is year number one of the new seven-year, $7.7 billion media rights deal, which saw longtime broadcast partners Fox and NBC retained while former partner TNT Sports returned for the first time since 2014 and Amazon Prime Video was introduced to the scene for the first time.
Naturally, to make room for Prime and TNT to broadcast five races each, both Fox and NBC had to give up several races. Fox's season-opening portion of the schedule was reduced from 18 races (16 points races) to 14 (12), and NBC's season-ending portion of the schedule dropped from 20 races down to 14.
Prior to the new deal, most of Fox's races were shown on Fox, while a number of them were shown on Fox Sports 1. This year, Fox Sports 1 was responsible for the majority of Fox's races, nine of 14 to be exact.
Likewise, the NBC races were previously split half and half between NBC and USA Network, which effectively replaced NBC Sports Network as the alternate channel during NBC's portion of the schedule when NBC Sports Network shut down after 2021.
But while USA Network is still responsible for 10 events, NBC itself is only responsible for four, and while NBC's portion of this year's schedule began three weekends ago at Iowa Speedway, the Cup Series has still yet to see a race shown live on NBC this year.
After the races at Iowa, Watkins Glen, and Richmond Raceway were shown live on USA Network, the first Cup Series race of the year on NBC is scheduled to take place this weekend at Daytona International Speedway to conclude the regular season.
NASCAR Cup Series set for first NBC race of 2025
The trio in the broadcast booth remains the same whether a race is shown on USA Network or NBC, of course, with Leigh Diffey serving as the lead announcer alongside longtime analysts Jeff Burton and Steve Letarte.
Diffey came over from IndyCar last year after it was announced that IndyCar would be moving from NBC to Fox for 2025, and he replaced longtime lead announcer Rick Allen ahead of last summer's Daytona race.
Next weekend, however, things are set to shift back over to USA Network for the playoff opener at Darlington Raceway, and they are scheduled to remain on USA Network for the first seven races of the four-round, 10-race playoffs.
NBC is not responsible for airing another race until Sunday, October 19, when the middle race of the semifinal round of 8 is scheduled to take place at Talladega Superspeedway.
This race is the first of three in a row set to be shown on NBC to wrap up the season. Martinsville Speedway is scheduled to host the round of 8 finale on Sunday, October 26, and Phoenix Raceway is scheduled to host the Championship 4 on Sunday, November 2.
Next year's full broadcast schedule has not yet been revealed, but it is expected to follow the same structure as this year's.
Tune in to NBC at 7:30 p.m. ET this evening for the live broadcast of the Coke Zero Sugar 400 from Daytona International Speedway. If you haven't already done so, begin a free trial of FuboTV now and don't miss the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series regular season finale!