In 2013, Silverstone introduced a ‘band’ system to categorise and therefore vary the price of their tickets. For years, fans will have been use to the grandstands being categorised into bronze, silver, gold and platinum, but the variations in views from within the grandstands prompted Silverstone to make drastic changes to that idea.

The new ticket band system addresses this problem and now the range of tickets stretches over 12 categories – or ‘bands’ as they are now officially known.

Tickets that are in Band 1 are the most expensive and therefore have the best view of the circuit. The price starts to decrease by about £20 to £30 per band, until you get the cheapest tickets that fall into Band 12.

The ‘band’ system includes both 3 day weekend grandstands and single day grandstand tickets, but excludes General Admission tickets. General Admission passes are priced purely only on whether you buy individual days or go for a weekend. You will find the same grandstands in multiple bands, with each offering a better/worse view based on how much your budget will allow you to spend.

So let’s take a look at some examples to see what you get for your money:

Band 1

At the time of writing, BookF1.com only has one type of ticket available in Band 1 which is Club Silverstone at Becketts. Not only do you get a brilliant view with this ticket from the Becketts grandstand, Club Silverstone gets you free parking, a programme, improved catering facilities (marquee style) as well as a few other perks and goodies. These are £430 each for the full weekend.

Band 1 isn’t a great example of what the new band system is all about though. You pay the premium price for Club Silverstone because of the additional perks, not necessarily getting a better view than a normal Becketts ticket. Here is the band system in full swing:

Club Corner – Band 2, 3, 4 and 5 – why?

Club Corner is a personal favourite of ours at Silverstone. Since the new circuit was finished a couple of years ago, Club grandstand offers a great view at the hub of the action during the British Grand Prix. Club is such a big and wide grandstand, it makes perfect sense to group the seats into bands and offer them at different prices.

The most expensive Club Corner tickets fall into Band 2 and are £392 for the weekend. Band 2 gets you a seat in the far left of the stand which enables you to see across to Vale and Club, but also the premium of looking down the pit straight and towards Abbey (turn 1).

The price decreases in Band 3, Band 4 and Band 5 to £376, £344 and £328 respectively as your seat moves further to the right, which is further round Club Corner. This means your view of the International Pit Straight decreases, hence the price drop.

It’s the same with other grandstands, including the International Pit Straight, Stowe, Village, Luffield and Farm which all lie in multiple Bands. Most of the websites selling British Grand Prix tickets offer galleries of photos from each position in each grandstand enabling you to check you are happy with the view you will be getting. You can do this on BookF1.com right here.