As early as March of this season it was clear that the transfer market would be unlike anything women’s cycling had ever seen. For a few seasons, there had been talk of growing salaries, especially with the implementation of the UCI’s WorldTour minimum wage in 2020, but it wasn’t until Demi Vollering’s departure from SD Worx-Protime was confirmed that the number €1 million was thrown around. The report that UAE Team ADQ had approached the 2023 Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift winner with that number was ultimately debunked, but it set off a chain reaction that saw salaries rise even more ahead of the 2025 season.
Unfortunately, this increase in pay is only available to those at the top of the sport. While the top women are earning in the mid-six figures, women on Continental teams who line up against those same top riders are still barely surviving on €10,000 a year.
The UCI introduced a WorldTour tier to the women’s peloton in 2020, and with it minimum salary requirements for all riders. The starting salary at the time was €15,000, a far cry from what women are looking at only four years later. That minimum has increased over the years and as of 2025 the base-level salary for WorldTour riders will be €31,768 for new riders who are team employees and €52,000 for self-employed neo-pros, or €38,000 for veteran employee riders and €62,320 for self-employed established riders. That is up from €35,000 for employed returning riders in 2024. Moreover, 2025 will see the formation of a ProTeam category with a base salary of €20,000, meaning more women will receive a mandated salary in 2025 than ever before. That minimum wage will increase to €24,000 by 2027. Most riders are self-employed and legally classified as contractors, so the standard baseline is €62,320. There are some teams that prefer to sign riders as employees of the team, which is a lower baseline salary but also includes more benefits depending on the country.
The gradual increase in salaries for the 15 WorldTeams mandated by the UCI has helped the increase in pay, but with an increase in live coverage of races plus more exposure thanks to races like the Tour de France Femmes and Paris-Roubaix Femmes, the 2024 transfer market saw higher numbers than some expected.
There were a few top teams that set the mark in terms of paychecks as recently as 2020, but which failed to match salaries offered by other teams this year. And, there are some WorldTeams closer to the bottom of the rankings that struggled to meet even the minimum salary required, and so saw their best riders walk away ahead of 2025.
One agent said that the majority of the contracts they managed for the 2025 season were €75,000 to €90,000, with salaries starting at roughly €80,000. They saw riders go from €45,000 a year on a higher-level Continental team to €300,000 per year on a lower-level WorldTeam. In addition, bonuses are more generous than they’ve ever seen.
The agent also said talks for 2026 have already begun before the 2025 season has even started. Considering teams had their rosters all but wrapped up by July of this season, it makes sense some teams who may have missed the boat are already getting ahead of the new transfer season.
Sources inside the sport say that the top few riders in the world make as much as €900,000 a year. But that’s less than a handful; the rest of the top 20 best-paid riders earn roughly between €200,000-€500,000. Domestiques at top teams are said to make €150,000 or more – as much as double that if they’re also riders who win on their own once in a while. But after that the numbers drop quickly.
The rising tide isn’t raising all boats … yet
There are a number of factors that have led to teams offering higher salaries. In general, teams have higher budgets now than they did four years ago. Exposure is a major factor here. Sponsors can see their logos on live coverage of races, with higher viewing figures every year. They are then more likely to up the checks they send teams.
There is more pressure on teams to find more funding as well. At the end of 2024, a massive number of top riders were out of contract. That’s pretty standard for an Olympic year; traditionally riders want to be comfortably set up through the Games and then have the option to either stay where they are or head to pastures new.
When it came to signing those top riders, the top teams went in strong with big numbers. Vollering’s rumoured €1 million contract offer led to other teams scrambling to offer other riders close to Vollering’s calibre a similar number. There are more teams with the budget to be able to sign these top names.
Riders down the totem pole are making significantly less than the A-level riders they support in races, but still significantly more than they would have been a few years ago. In women’s cycling, it’s starting to pay to be a good domestique.
That’s the good news, but the overall picture is mixed. Every year The Cyclists’ Alliance, or TCA, does an anonymous rider survey to determine how much support riders are receiving from all levels of team and pinpoint problem areas that will need attention in the future. Over all seven of their surveys, they have determined a widening gap between the top teams and Continental teams and even to some WorldTour teams, and 2024 was no different.
In the seventh edition of their survey, TCA received data from 100 different female cyclists over 45 different teams. They found that although the general trend is positive for WorldTour teams, 27% of non-WorldTour riders receive little to no income. One alarming figure points to 55% of women outside of the WorldTour who told TCA they earn less than €10,000 a year. Some of those riders still compete against WorldTeams and in WorldTour events. One in four riders works a second job alongside racing to make ends meet.
The positive development is that fewer riders in the Continental ranks are fully unpaid in 2024 vs. 2023. This season only 15% of riders surveyed were unpaid, whereas in 2023 25% were paid nothing.
One alarming finding from the survey unrelated to salary was that one in five women feel unsafe in their team, a statistic that has doubled since 2023.
The introduction of a ProTeam category will hopefully curb the situation somewhat. Seven teams have been awarded ProTeam status in 2025: Arkéa-B&B Hotels, Cofidis, EF-Oatly-Cannondale, Laboral Kutxa-Fundación Euskadi, St Michel-Preference Home-Auber93, VolkerWessels and Winspace-Orange Seal. There are roughly 90 women who will race for these seven teams and earn a minimum wage, some of them will make a good amount more than the UCI’s ProTeam minimum.
The survey also showed an increase in WorldTour riders who make between €50,000 and €100,000, with the percentage of riders making over €100,000 doubling since 2023.
Down the road
As women’s cycling continues to gain momentum salary numbers are expected to continue to increase. That means the top women, who are currently making over €300,000, will get even closer to and perhaps even eventually pass the €1 million mark. It also means the rest of the riders on WorldTeams will make more. The value of a legendary domestique will go up. Teams will need to cough up more for valued riders who will have other options proposed to them. There are also a lot more riders working with agents, and more value for agents to work with riders which will lead to high salaries as well. Those agents will have a lot of fun negotiating for their clients in the coming years.
There will likely continue to be a widening gap between Continental teams and WorldTeams, but the two levels won’t be competing at the same events. ProTeams that pay their riders will race against WorldTeams while Continental teams build a base for new and developing riders to prove themselves worthy of the higher ranks.
While it seems like women will continue to earn more in the field of professional cycling, the rise in salaries depends on how the sport continues in the coming years. Zwift’s investment in the Tour de France Femmes has been a huge reason the race has been so successful to date, but that contract ends after the 2025 edition. If the partnership ends, that might impact the coverage of the race, which would in turn impact the attention the race pulls towards women’s cycling and the surrounding sponsors resulting in less money flowing into the sport. Since the introduction of the minimum wage and mandatory coverage of WorldTour races, many things have gone right, resulting in a more valuable landscape, but nothing is guaranteed.
Asking Continental teams to provide their riders with a minimum wage would likely mean the closure of quite a few teams, but if those teams are unable to provide for their riders while requiring them to sacrifice for the team they shouldn’t be operating with a UCI logo on the jersey. The space those teams leave behind would hopefully, in time, be filled with teams and sponsors that are able to support their riders better. A minimum wage for Continental teams is not the starting point, however, to improve the lower level of the sport. Requiring teams to create a safe and secure environment is critical, and that is something the UCI could do right away.
The Cyclists’ Alliance survey sheds some light on the situation in both the WorldTour and in Continental teams, and that information is hugely important to understanding the sport as a whole. For now, all signs point to a continued rise in salaries for WorldTour riders, and hopefully, the trend will trickle down to the lower-level teams as more sponsors try to find a way to gain entry into the market. WorldTour riders earning more is a win for the sport, but the widening gap between those at the top and those in the mid-tier will not benefit the sport in the long run. What the introduction of the ProTeam category does to fill that gap remains to be seen, but it is a step in the right direction to having more teams held to a professional standard for women.
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