Lawson reveals online abuse forced him to mute all F1 social media accounts

Liam Lawson has spoken candidly about the online abuse he suffered as a Formula 1 driver, revealing he muted every F1-related social media account and deleted his apps after being overwhelmed by hateful messages following his on-track incident with Sergio Perez at the 2024 Mexico City Grand Prix.

Speaking on the High Performance podcast, the New Zealander described the moment he realised the scale of the problem. “I hadn’t even had Instagram notifications muted at that point,” he said. “And it was just my phone… I’ve never seen anything like it. The messages, the comments on posts, the craziest stuff you could imagine people saying. Just the most horrible things.”

Lawson’s turbulent 12 months in F1 provided fertile ground for online criticism. He replaced Daniel Ricciardo at Racing Bulls after the 2024 Singapore Grand Prix, completed the remainder of that season, and then signed with Red Bull to partner Max Verstappen in 2025. After just two races with the Milton Keynes team, however, he was demoted back to Racing Bulls and replaced by Yuki Tsunoda — a sequence of events that kept him in the eye of a vocal and often hostile online fanbase.

Rather than attempt to filter the noise, Lawson chose to remove it altogether. “Every single Formula 1 account is muted. It’s just completely muted. So I don’t see anything to do with it online,” he explained. “I had people telling me, ‘Oh, did you hear about this?’ No, no idea.”

He acknowledged that stepping back from social media had a meaningful impact on his wellbeing. “It made a big difference,” he said. “There are so many opinions and rumours and things that go around that are just so untrue, and if you really focus on every single one, it would drive you crazy.”

Lawson also reflected on the broader pattern of scrutiny he has faced, suggesting that some of the most difficult moments of his short career have ultimately shaped him. “There are little things that have happened to me over my short career in Formula 1 so far that at the time were quite big, but I’ve looked back on and been grateful for,” he said.

The comments add Lawson’s voice to a growing conversation in elite sport about the mental health toll of social media abuse on athletes, particularly in a fanbase as large and passionate as Formula 1’s.