We study the Sobolev regularity on the sphere S d of the uncentered fractional Hardy-Littlewood maximal operator M β at the endpoint p = 1, when acting on polar data. We firstWe then prove that the mapwhen restricted to polar data. Our methods allow us to give a new proof of the continuity of the map f → |∇ M β f | from W 1,1 rad (R d ) to L q (R d ). Moreover, we prove that a conjectural local boundedness for the centered fractional Hardy-Littlewood maximal operator M β implies the continuity of the map f → |∇M β f | from W 1,1 to L q , in the context of polar functions on S d and radial functions on R d .