Alex Palou Won $3.8 Million For His Indy 500 Victory

Winning the Indy 500 isn’t always about money for IndyCar drivers, but they get a lot of it.

The 2025 Indy 500 purse was a record $20,283,000 this year and winner Alex Palou’s team took home the lion’s share.

Chip Ganassi Racing received $3.8 million, which will be split between Palou and the team based on the company’s bonus structure.

“The Indianapolis 500 is the greatest race in the world, and winning this race makes history in more ways than one,” IndyCar and IMS president J. Douglas Boles said in a news release.

“The Month of May featured a grandstand sellout crowd and intense on-track action. Alex Palou adds Indianapolis 500 winner to his long list of growing achievements and takes home the largest purse in Indianapolis 500 history. There’s no better way to end an epic month.”

Had Josef Newgarden won his third Indy 500 in a row, he would’ve earned an extra $20,000 bonus from sponsor Borg-Warner. The bonus increases by $20,000 each year until there is a repeat winner. Since Newgarden claimed the rollover $440,000 bonus last year, it was reset. Newgarden’s 2024 total payout of $4.3 million, while he earned $3.7 million for his first win in 2023.

Palou has won five of the first six races of the IndyCar season, a feat that was last accomplished by A.J. Foyt in 1979. He now leads the standings with 306 points followed by Pato O’Ward with 194. A race win is worth 50 points and the Indy 500 no longer gives double points, as it had in some past years.

Despite coming in third in the Indy 500, O’Ward actually received the second-largest payout at $951,000, due to the way it is calculated using various performance metrics from qualifying and the race along with IndyCar’s new charter system. Second-place finisher David Malukas won $667,300. Single-event entrant Kyle Larson, who wrecked out of the race on Lap 92, won the smallest amount at $102,000.