The 2024 Formula 1 “silly season” has been far more chaotic compared to last year when all 20 drivers remained with their respective teams.
For the 2025 season, there have already been seven confirmed driver changes involving six different teams, and it could become eight across seven teams following the recent announcement that Daniel Ricciardo has been replaced by Liam Lawson at RB for the last six races of the 24-race 2024 season.
Before the start of the 2024 season, it was revealed that Lewis Hamilton would be moving to Ferrari in 2025 to replace Carlos Sainz Jr., ending his 12-year tenure at Mercedes. Hamilton’s partnership with the Silver Arrows has been the most successful driver-team combination in Formula 1 history.
Sainz subsequently signed with Williams to replace Logan Sargeant, who had already been replaced by Franco Colapinto for the rest of the 2024 season, while rookie Andrea Kimi Antonelli was brought in to take Hamilton’s spot at Mercedes.
Elsewhere, Esteban Ocon is set to be replaced by rookie Jack Doohan at Alpine, with Ocon moving to Haas, who have also signed rookie Oliver Bearman. Neither Kevin Magnussen nor Nico Hulkenberg will be returning to Haas in 2025, and Hulkenberg has joined Sauber to take over for Zhou Guanyu.
If Sauber also decides to replace Valtteri Bottas, it would mean that only 11 of the 20 full-time drivers from the 2024 season will remain with their current teams in 2025.
This upheaval follows the first offseason in Formula 1 history without any driver changes.
All 20 drivers who ended the 2023 season stayed with their teams for 2024, something unprecedented in Formula 1’s history, which stretches back to 1950.
The fact that it happened at all was almost miraculous, and as the chaos of 2024 shows, it’s unlikely to happen again. Everything needed to align perfectly for no driver changes to occur.
The only change from the start of the 2023 season to the start of 2024 happened at RB, with Ricciardo stepping in mid-year to replace the underperforming Nyck de Vries.
Ricciardo was retained for the first 18 races of 2024 but met a similar fate ahead of the upcoming United States Grand Prix at Circuit of the Americas, with Lawson now set to replace him and likely stay with the Red Bull sister team next season.
Only three teams are expected to enter the 2025 season with the same driver lineup as in 2024.
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