2018 Season

Driver changes

Felipe Massa has retired from Formula One after 2017. He is replaced at Williams by former Renault test and SMP Racing driver Sergey Sirotkin, who makes his competitive début. Charles Leclerc, the reigning Formula 2 champion, joins Sauber in place of Pascal Wehrlein, who was unable to secure a race seat and joins Mercedes as a test and reserve driver while racing in the DTM. Leclerc had previously driven in Friday practice sessions in 2016 and 2017.

Toro Rosso promote 2016 GP2 champion Pierre Gasly and two-time World Endurance champion Brendon Hartley as their full-time drivers. Hartley becomes the first full-time New Zealand driver in Formula One since Denny Hulme in 1974. Both Gasly and Hartley made their Formula One débuts with the team during the latter stages of 2017. Daniil Kvyat departs the Red Bull driver programme, moving to a development role at Ferrari.

As part of Toro Rosso’s engine deal with Honda, Red Bull has loaned Carlos Sainz Jr. to Renault’s works team for 2018.

Team changes

McLaren terminate their partnership with Honda after repeated failures to supply a reliable and competitive power unit, signing a three-year deal with Renault. Toro Rosso part ways with Renault to accommodate that deal and sign an agreement to use full-works Honda power units — the first time Honda has supplied current-specification engines to a customer team. Sauber renew their Ferrari engine partnership, upgrading from year-old power units to current-specification units, and sign Alfa Romeo as their title sponsor.

Calendar

Twenty-one Grands Prix are scheduled, one more than 2017. The French Grand Prix returns for the first time since 2008, at the Circuit Paul Ricard — which last hosted the race in 1990 before the event moved to Magny-Cours. The German Grand Prix is back on the calendar after a one-year absence, held at the Hockenheimring. The Malaysian Grand Prix, part of the championship since 1999, is dropped from the calendar. The Russian Grand Prix moves from its April slot to September to fill that vacancy, and the Azerbaijan Grand Prix is brought forward to April to make room for France in June and to avoid clashing with the centenary of the Azerbaijani republic.

Regulation changes

The most visible change for 2018 is the mandatory introduction of the halo — a wishbone-shaped titanium frame anchored to the monocoque and arching above the driver’s head. The FIA examined seventeen accidents as case studies and concluded the halo would have prevented injuries in fifteen of them. The minimum chassis weight rises to 734 kg to accommodate the additional structure. Teams must purchase pre-fabricated halo units from approved suppliers; aerodynamic development on the halo is prohibited.

The grid penalty system is revised. A driver who changes a second power unit component during the same weekend is moved directly to the back of the grid rather than receiving further incremental penalties. Where multiple drivers are relegated to the back, their relative positions are determined by the chronological order of component changes, with the most recent change placing last.

Power unit component allocation is restructured: each driver may use up to three internal combustion engines, three MGU-H units, and three turbochargers; and two MGU-K units, two energy stores, and two control electronics units per season. Power unit suppliers must now provide all customer teams with an identical specification to their works team — a change introduced after Mercedes’s works team was observed to have access to additional performance settings unavailable to customers. Oil burning is capped at 0.6 litres per 100 kilometres, down from 1.2 litres in 2017, with teams required to declare a single oil specification before each race.

Shark fins and T-wings are banned. Race stewards may now penalise drivers for improper starts even without triggering the automated detection system. Red-flagged races restart with a standing start; a rolling restart is used only if the race director deems a standing start unsuitable. European races are pushed back one hour, with all races starting at ten minutes past the hour to allow broadcasters time for pre-race coverage.

The mid-season tyre test moves from Bahrain to Barcelona.

Tyres

Pirelli adds two new compounds for 2018. The hypersoft (pink sidewall) becomes the softest available; the superhard (orange) becomes the hardest, with the previous hard compound switching to ice blue. Pirelli is now permitted to supply non-sequential compounds — up to two steps apart — expanding the strategic options at each event. The hypersoft will make its racing début at Monaco.

Pre-season testing

Pre-season testing is held at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. Mercedes experienced significant tyre blistering on the newly resurfaced circuit, an issue that leads Pirelli to reduce tread depth by 0.4 mm across all compounds for the Spanish, French, and British Grands Prix later in the year.