The United Kingdom can proudly boast it is now the most prolific territory when it comes to television coverage of Formula One.

Figures released in F1’s annual broadcast report for 2012 show a total of 2,500 hours were aired accumulatively via satellite broadcaster Sky and free-to-air BBC.

Media rights were shared by both organisations last year, with Sky offering a dedicated F1 channel and showing every session live from every grand prix, whereas the BBC broadcast half of the 20 races live, with the remainder shown as highlights.

The reduction in terrestrial coverage, however, meant the reach fell slightly last year compared with 2011, from 32 million to 28.58 million.

Reach is defined as the number of people who have watched more than 15 non-consecutive minutes of the sport throughout the season.

Overall, on a global basis, F1’s audience also dropped marginally, although still remains at more than half-a-billion viewers. F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone has primarily blamed Asia for the fall, in particular China, as well as Japan.

In China, reach fell from 74.5 million viewers to under 50 million, while in Japan the drop was from 33 million to 29.5 million.

The fall in China was primarily due to scheduling clashes in the latter part of the year.

Ecclestone said: “A small handful of territories didn’t meet expectations in terms of reach, with the Chinese market suffering a decrease which could not be absorbed by a significant number of increases elsewhere.”

In the major markets, increases were noted in France, Italy, Spain and Brazil, with the latter remaining the largest for the sport both in terms of reach and average audience with a peak of 13.4 million viewers for the season-ending showdown at Interlagos.