Formula 1 in 2026: What are the key things to look out for next season?

The new rules introduced for 2026 are the biggest change in F1 for years.

Cars will be smaller, more agile and more environmentally friendly.

They will be 30 kg lighter, 10 cm narrower, have engines with an almost 50-50 split between electricity and internal combustion power, and use completely sustainable fuels.

Will racing be different? Yes, but how different it is from one of many unknowns.

Never have the chassis and engine rules been changed so much at the same time.

There will be new aerodynamic rules and the power units, although similar to the architecture of the last 12 years, have been significantly changed in terms of technology.

The engines remained 1.6-litre V6 turbo hybrids, but the MGU-H, which recovered energy from the exhaust and turbo, was removed and the proportion of power produced by the hybrid part of the engine was almost doubled to around 50%.

This required major changes in aerodynamics. In addition to abandoning the venturi-underbody ground effect philosophy introduced in 2022, moving front and rear wings were also introduced. The purpose of this is to increase straight line speed to allow more energy to be harvested during braking.

For some time now, drivers have been expressing varying levels of concern about how this would impact racing.

It looks like there will be some unique features. The internal combustion engine will spend most of its time acting as a generator for the battery. So, for example, the engines will be at maximum speed in some corners.

The DRS overtaking assist was gone because the rear wing deployment was required for other purposes. So instead, there will be a push-to-go button that gives extra electrical energy for a while.

“It’s really hard to predict how this will happen,” says Lewis Hamilton. “I don’t want to give in to that. I don’t want to say too many negative things.

“It’s a very different feeling and I’m not sure you’ll like it. But maybe I’ll be surprised. Maybe it’ll be amazing. Maybe overtaking will be incredible. Maybe overtaking will be easier. I don’t know.”

“We have less downforce, more torque. I can imagine driving in the rain will be very, very, very difficult. Much more difficult than what we had today. But as I said, we can get there and have better grip than we expected.”