Seven years ago, we published a chart showing what it would set you back to park your superyacht in Port Hercule for the Monaco Formula 1 Grand Prix.
At the time, the numbers were eye-watering. €128,000 (including VAT) to berth the biggest vessels in the port through a Formula 1 weekend. But looking at them now, you’d be forgiven for thinking they were almost quaint.
You have to remember, of course, that this was 2019. Early 2019, when COVID hadn’t yet been uttered and the first season of Drive to Survive was only two months old. But that was then, and this is now.
According to this year’s official Société d’Exploitation des Ports de Monaco brochure, an aquatic parking space for one of the world’s most prestigious sporting events has increased by as much as 138%. It tracks almost perfectly with what Formula 1 itself has become.
Cast your mind back to the world in April 2019, when we first ran these numbers. Most casual sports fans could name Lewis Hamilton and perhaps Fernando Alonso, but the rest of the paddock may as well have been wearing their helmets 24/7 to the everyday punter.
Even for the fair weather fan, however, the Monaco Grand Prix has always represented the best of the best in motorsport, with close-quarters street racing against the backdrop of billionaires and their boats.
Then the pandemic hit and Drive to Survive landed on Netflix, introducing the world’s premier motorsport to an entirely new global audience almost overnight.
Now every man and his dog wants a piece of the Formula 1 action, propelling the sport into one of the most valuable commercial properties on the planet. And nowhere is this more prominent than during the Monaco Grand Prix weekend. Where the preferred mode of transport doesn’t even come on wheels.
Each year, Port Hercule becomes the most concentrated display of private wealth, operating as a floating hospitality venue, and the Société d’Exploitation des Ports de Monaco – the committee tasked with allocating the mooring during a Formula 1 race weekend – prices it accordingly.
Zone 1 remains trackside, Zone 2 around the Piscine, Zone 3 in-port with no race view, and Fontvieille across the headland. But every bracket has marched upward.
For a 50–59 metre superyacht in the best trackside position, you are now looking at €110,135 for the week, up from €74,737 in 2019. Similarly, the smallest boat on the list (under 19.5m) has gone up to €22,316 from just €10,918 in 2019. That’s a jump of 104%. Of course, none of this is likely to deter anyone already in the conversation.
At the time of writing, BOATPro reports 106 yachts are berthed in Port Hercule, and a further 180 are anchored along the Riviera between Roquebrune-Cap-Martin and Beaulieu-sur-Mer.
Among the headline acts: Lürssen's 122-metre Kismet – the Motor Yacht of the Year 2025, available for charter at €3,000,000 a week – Feadship's hydrogen-powered Breakthrough, fresh from winning the same award in 2026, Bernard Arnault's 101.5-metre Symphony, and the formerly impounded Alfa Nero.
The Monaco Grand Prix is the crème de la crème of the Formula 1 calendar precisely because it makes no concessions to accessibility. The circuit is too narrow to produce great racing by modern standards. The geography is absurd. The cost of entry, at every level, is punishing. And yet the waiting list for a trackside berth grows longer every year.
It tells you everything you need to know about where the sport has arrived.
