2026 F1 Regulations: What Was Removed and What Changes

The 2026 Formula 1 regulations are the biggest rewrite of the rulebook in more than a decade. Two long-standing pieces of technology are gone altogether, and almost everything else about how the car makes its lap time has been re-cut.

What has been removed

The MGU-H is deleted. The exhaust-heat recovery unit that teams spent a decade perfecting disappears, along with the trick of harvesting energy from the turbo. The Drag Reduction System is abolished as well: there is no longer a flap for the chasing car to open on the straight. Those two deletions change the sound, the strategy and the way a driver attacks a lap.

What changes

The power unit becomes a 50/50 split between the internal combustion engine and the electrical side. The engine is limited to around 400 kW while the MGU-K grows to 350 kW, and both run on 100 per cent sustainable fuel, measured by energy rather than mass flow.

Aerodynamics move to active aero. The front and rear wings both move: the car runs a high-downforce Z mode through the corners and a low-drag X mode on the straights, switching automatically rather than by a driver button.

The car itself is smaller and lighter. Width drops to 1,900 mm, the wheelbase is capped at around 3,400 mm, the minimum weight falls by about 30 kg and the tyres are narrower front and rear. Downforce is cut by roughly 30 per cent and drag by a large margin, which is the part that matters most for wheel-to-wheel racing.