A Full Preview of the 2026 F1 Season: New Regulations, Teams, and More.

The start of the new year brings many things. A fresh start for everyone, new resolutions that may or may not be followed. And finally, the beginning of a new Formula One World Championship season. This year brings many new things. New regulations, two new teams, one new driver, and a new defending world champion. I'm going to explain all of it and more right here.

Every couple decades, the FIA decides to change the full regulations related to how each teams car should be made. Since 2022, F1 has been under the "Ground Effect Era" of regulations. Now, we will be entering a new regulations era in 2026 with many changes. This will start with multiple changes to the power units, which will still produce over 1,000 bhp (horsepower). However, the biggest changes will come in the form of the car size and aerodynamics being changed. The most notable of these is the end of the Drag Reduction System, or DRS, that has been used in F1 since 2011. This is being replaced by a new system called Manual Override Mode, or MOM, that will give drivers more control over when they want to reduce drag throughout a race. Many other new elements are being added such as boost mode, recharge mode, and overtake mode.

Now onto the new teams and new engine manufacturing changes. This year will introduce two new teams, Cadillac and Audi. Cadillac is the 11th team on the grid, and has hired verteran drivers Sergio Perez and Valterri Bottas to drive for them, two drivers who have both played #2 for two of the best drivers ever, Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton. Cadillac will be using Ferrari engines until they finish developing their own engines, expected to be ready around the 2029 season. Audi, on the other hand, is not a completely new team, as they are taking over Kick Sauber. They are developing their own engine, and believe me, it sounds nice. They are however, still interiting Sauber's drivers of Nico Hulkenburg and Gabriel Bortoleto. As for the other teams, Red Bull and Racing Bulls are leaving their Honda partnership to partner with Ford to make their new engines, and Honda is becoming an independent engine supplier who will be supplying Aston Martin, who had previously been using Mercedes engines. Finally, Alpine is leaving Renault and will become customer team of Mercedes. Outside of Cadillac, no other driver changes took place outside of. Isack Hadjar taking Yuki Tsunoda's seat at Red Bull and Arvid Lindblad being promoted to Racing Bulls.

The last big changes before the new season comes in the calender. The Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix at the Imola Circuit is being discontinued. The Spanish Grand Prix is being moved to a new street circuit in Madrid called the Madring. As for Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, it is getting its own Grand Prix called the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix.

Before I finish this article, I want to give everyone some insight on who might be competing for the Drivers and Constructors Championship. Red Bull and Mercedes have found loopholes in the new regulations that allowed them to gain 10-13 horsepower, which would allow them to shave off a few tenths of a second a lap. So in my opinion, the Drivers championship will come down to either Max Verstappen or George Russell, but the Constructors Championship will most likely go back to Mercedes.