Tour de France Femmes broadcaster France Télévisions has announced that the race has broken TV audience records in the country again this year.
Last summer's edition, which saw home success with Pauline Ferrand-Prévot capturing the yellow jersey and Maëva Squiban winning two stages, set record viewing highs that have now been pushed even higher.
A 32.9% average audience share across all nine stages set a record unmatched in the previous four editions of the race, while "23.2 million French people watched at least one minute of the race," reported France Télévisions.
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A peak audience of 5.1 million viewers tuned in to watch Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney soar to a stage win and the yellow jersey atop Mont Ventoux with an average audience share of 41.5%. The final day in Nice brought in 3.5 million viewers.
The race's nine stages averaged 2.6 million viewers, down 100,000 on 2025, though that's to be expected given the lack of home success and Pauline Ferrand-Prévot's withdrawal.
Elsewhere, online video viewership on france.tv and franceinfo also rose (4.5 million views, up 18% on 2025), as did views on the broadcaster's social media channels (60 million, up 6%). There was also improvement in youth audience viewing figures, with the audience share among 15-to-34-year-olds rising to 24.7%.
"The fifth edition of the Tour de France Femmes has reached a historic milestone in terms of audience share, consolidating the lasting place of women’s cycling in the French broadcasting landscape," read a statement from France Télévisions.
The news comes amid calls for the race to be broadcast in full to match the men's edition, which began full coverage of all stages back in 2017. This year's edition of the Tour de France Femmes saw three stages, including the Lausanne opener, the hilly stage 5, and the finale in Nice, receive start-to-finish broadcasts.
During this year's race, Cycling Weekly reported that riders were disappointed by the situation, which notably missed the start of Sigrid Haugset's record-breaking 88km winning effort on stage 3 to Poligny.
Race director Marion Rousse said that she has held discussions with France Télévisions on the subject. She sounded a note of hope for future implementation of full-stage coverage.
"What’s certain is that I’ve discussed this at length with France Télévisions, and we’re giving serious consideration to broadcasting all the stages in full in the future because the women deserve it, and because it works well in terms of audience figures," she said.
"We’re currently giving it real consideration, which is a step forward. Things are moving in the right direction."
Meanwhile, UCI President David Lappartient hailed the Tour's progress, in particular the TV viewing figures and ASO's ambitions.
"The TV audiences are also very high," he told WielerFlits.
"I think it's important to consolidate the popularity of this race, to also have live TV from the start to the finish. That was the case today, but it will not be the case for all the other stages.
"But we can really see that the organiser ASO is trying to improve every year and do something more every year. I really see a bright future for women's cycling and the Tour de France Femmes."
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