Cadillac entered last and owns the second best rated livery on the grid
The Cadillac livery is rated 3.8 out of 5 by the motorsport audience, second of eleven teams, while the Audi rebrand rates 2.5.
Cadillac joined the grid in 2026 as the eleventh team and finishes most weekends at the back. The audience rates its livery 3.8 out of 5, second of the eleven teams, above Ferrari, Mercedes and McLaren.
Livery ratings come from the design vote on BoxBoxd, where the audience scores every car of the season out of five. Red Bull Racing leads on 4.3. Cadillac takes second on 3.8 from 3,467 votes.
The other new identity of the season records the opposite result. Audi, which took over an existing team rather than starting from a blank sheet, rates 2.5 and finishes eleventh of eleven.
Red Bull Racing
Cadillac
Haas
Mercedes
Williams
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Ferrari
Aston Martin
Alpine
McLaren
AudiWhy does a blank sheet beat a rebrand?
Two identities arrived in the same season under opposite conditions. One created a new name with no history attached to it. The other replaced a name the audience already held an image of. Same novelty, same moment and a spread of 1.3 points between them on the same scale.
A brand taking over an existing sporting asset inherits the memory attached to it and has to overwrite it. A brand creating one starts with nothing to contradict. On this evidence the second route builds design equity faster, which is a finding that applies well beyond a car.
What does entering the grid buy in audience terms?
The Cadillac audience is concentrated in one market. 40.4% of it is in the United States against 18.9% for the platform overall, an index of 2.1. Mexico takes 16%, far above its platform share, which follows the driver line up.
Inside that audience Sergio Pérez is the most named driver at 35.7% and __other__ is second at 15.3%, for a team he has never raced for.
The audience is the smallest measured on the platform this season, so the composition is the reading rather than the precision. What it shows is that entering the sport does not buy a diffuse global audience. It buys a country and here it buys two.
What a first partner is buying
A team at the back of the grid sells a result it does not have. What the data says it does have is a design the audience rates second on the grid and a national market it holds at an index above two.
The first commercial partner measured on the car, Jim Beam, starts from 71.9% recognition and 71.9% attribution, the lowest of the season and the only reading in the set with no prior era behind it.
For a brand choosing between a winning team and a new one, the trade is legible for the first time. Results buy exposure now. A new identity buys a design the audience likes, a market it is concentrated in and an association nobody else has claimed yet.
Frequently asked questions
How is the Cadillac F1 livery rated by fans?
3.8 out of 5 from 3,467 votes on BoxBoxd, second of the eleven teams on the 2026 grid.
Where is the Cadillac F1 audience based?
40.4% in the United States and 16% in Mexico, both far above the platform average, which follows the driver line up.
Why is the Audi livery rated lowest on the grid?
Audi rates 2.5 out of 5, eleventh of eleven. It replaced an existing team identity where Cadillac created a new one and the audience rates the blank sheet 1.3 points higher.
Want this reading on your own brand?
The full report behind this article, with the split by team audience, market composition and the change across the season, is available to teams, brands and agencies.
Source: BoxBoxd, the motorsport social network. The Brand Recall Index is measured on the BoxBoxd audience through the 2026 season, where a blurred sponsor logo is shown with no name attached and three questions follow: name the brand, name the team, place the branding on the car. The one number version of this reading, for citation, is at boxboxd.fun/brand-index/best-rated-f1-livery.