The top 10 F1 drivers of 2025

10. Alex Albon

2025 position: 8^th, 73 points

If only Alex Albon had finished the season as he had started it, then he would have been significantly higher on this list. But a dismal run of zero points from the final eight Grands Prix (save for three points in the United States sprint) means he just clinches tenth spot ahead of Haas driver Oliver Bearman, who enjoyed a fine rookie season in what was a very limited car for the most part.

Albon was sensational early on in a Williams that was not expected to perform as well as it did, particularly as its development was stopped soon after the season had started, given the focus on the wide-sweeping changes to the 2026 regulations. The Thai-British driver scored points in seven of the first eight races, including a trio of fifths in Australia, Miami and Imola before the wheels came off with a trio of successive retirements in Spain, Canada and Austria. There were further strong finishes in four of the next five races, only to be thoroughly undermined by the concluding third of the year.

9. Fernando Alonso

2025 position: 10^th, 56 points

For only the third time in his remarkable F1 career, Fernando Alonso failed to score a point in his first eight Grands Prix. The other two occasions were his debut year in 2001 with Minardi, and his maiden season with McLaren in 2015 after the team returned to Honda power. In a dog of a car from Aston Martin, though, he somehow managed to stem the tide of misery. After the first six races, he qualified the car in the top ten in 11 of the remaining 18, and he out-qualified team-mate Lance Stroll for every Grand Prix. No mean feat.

The fact he scored points in ten of the final 16 races was an achievement in itself, given the lack of development on the AMR25, with the high point a fifth place in Hungary. Despite all of Alonso's experience and race-craft, however, it was not enough for the team to clinch sixth position in the Constructors' Championship, falling just three points shy. But after his shocking start, the fact it finished even that close was a testament to his achievements over the closing two-thirds of the campaign.   

8. Carlos Sainz

2025 position: 9^th, 64 points

If you could combine the first half of Albon's season with the second half for Carlos Sainz Jr., then Williams would have enjoyed as near as perfect a season as it could have hoped for. Instead, there is this bizarre imbalance. The reason why Sainz is ahead of Albon, despite finishing nine points and one position behind his team-mate, is because it was a new team for the Spanish driver compared to Albon's fourth season, and most significantly, Sainz scored two podiums late on. Albon is still awaiting his first in 90 starts.

Although disappointed not to hit the ground running following his switch from Ferrari, and often bemoaning he could find no rhythm with the car, Sainz still scored points in six of the first ten races (though he was no higher than eighth). As the year wore on, and he started to feel more comfortable, performances and results followed, notably those thirds in Azerbaijan and Qatar, playing a key role in Williams securing a superb fifth in the Constructors' Championship.

7. Kimi Antonelli

2025 position: 7^th, 150 points

At 18, Kimi Antonelli made an inauspicious F1 debut when he crashed his Mercedes minutes into the opening practice session of the 2024 Italian Grand Prix at Monza. Far from the impact the young Italian would have dreamed of on home soil, a day later, he was confirmed as the replacement for seven-time Champion Lewis Hamilton.

In stepping into such sizeable shoes Antonelli far from disgraced himself, but endured the most stunning sequence of results, initially scoring points in five of the first six flyaway races before managing only three points in nine European Grands Prix, sandwiching his first podium when he finished third in Canada. Once the flyaways began again, so Antonelli's form improved, with the highlight being his claiming runner-up in the São Paulo Sprint and Grand Prix. You sense there is far more to come from this blossoming talent. 

6. Isack Hadjar

2025 position: 12^th, 51 points

On 7^th December 2024, Isack Hadjar stalled on the grid in the title-deciding F2 feature race, wrecking his Championship chances. Just shy of a year later, Red Bull confirmed the young French-Algerian driver would partner Max Verstappen in 2026 following a stellar year that commenced in cruel fashion, when he crashed his Racing Bulls on the formation lap of the season-opening Australian Grand Prix.

As a rookie on his debut, and with the spotlight firmly on him — not least when Hamilton's father, Anthony, placed a consoling arm around him, and offered soothing words of advice as they walked down the Albert Park paddock — many lesser drivers might have crumbled from there. Not Hadjar. He proved himself to be made of sterner stuff and worthy of his place in F1, with several stand-out drives, the highlight being his third place in the Dutch Grand Prix. Arguably, his points total does not do him justice. Next year, though, he faces the acid test of his credentials.

5. Charles Leclerc

2025 position: 5^th, 242 points

A stand-alone fifth in the Drivers' Championship, so a natural fifth in these rankings, there were many occasions when Charles Leclerc pulled off a result seemingly beyond the capability of the car, the aerodynamic development of which was shut down in late April after team boss Frédéric Vasseur recognised the Scuderia was not in a position to challenge for either Championship this season.

That Ferrari went from finishing 14 points behind McLaren in the Constructors' Championship last year, to 435 this past campaign says it all, and that for Leclerc, and new team-mate Hamilton, it was a season to forget. Whilst Hamilton failed to register a top three finish for the first time in his F1 career, Leclerc still scored seven podiums, at least affording the Scuderia a semblance of respect in an otherwise miserable year.

4. George Russell

2025 position: 4^th, 319 points

Aside from Verstappen, Norris and Piastri, George Russell was the only other driver to win a Grand Prix over the record-equalling 24-race season, doing so deservedly in Canada and Singapore, whilst there were an additional seven podiums along that way that ensured 2025 was comfortably his best year in Formula 1, not just from a statistical point of view, but also from a performance perspective. He was easily the best of the rest behind the trio of title-chasing protagonists.

The British driver appeared to thrive in being the de facto number one inside the team for the first time, and with a more stable car beneath him compared to the previous iterations from Mercedes since the introduction of the ground-effect regulations in 2022, Russell was able to deliver consistent, reliable results, even if the W16 was still not a close enough match for its rivals.

3. Oscar Piastri

2025 position: 3^rd, 420 points

Up to and including the Dutch Grand Prix, in which he took the chequered flag for the seventh time in the first 15 races, it appeared for all the world as if F1 would be hailing its first Champion from Australia since 1980. In only his third season, Oscar Piastri was delivering cool, calm, level-headed drives beyond his years and was rightly earning the plaudits for doing so. After Zandvoort, where Norris retired, he was 34 points clear of his team-mate, with Verstappen seemingly dead and buried, 104 points back.

But then came Monza, where McLaren's team order to hand back second position to Norris due to the Briton encountering a slower pit-stop messed with Piastri’s head, openly he conceded, and from which he never truly recovered until late on. He then astonishingly crashed in qualifying and the race in Azerbaijan, and he was annoyed again by team affairs in Singapore. He also suffered miserably around the low-grip circuits in Austin, where he collided with Norris in the sprint, and Mexico City. It was a case of what might have been.

2. Lando Norris

2025 position: 1^st, 423 points

Over the course of the season, Lando Norris may have just done enough to be Champion, but not enough overall to top this list. By his own admission, after starting the season superbly with a win in Australia, he struggled for several races thereafter. Small mistakes here and there, slow getaways off the line severely compromised him, and then came his shocking aberration in Montréal, where he went for a gap that simply did not exist and ran into the back of Piastri.

The aforementioned retirement in Zandvoort pitched Norris adrift of Piastri, and from there, it appeared a long way back. But with a team of people around him, something he shared after the season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, he rebuilt his challenge, and as Piastri wilted, Norris bloomed, scoring crucial victories in Mexico and Brazil in particular to take charge. There were nerves late on, but a more mentally robust Norris stood up to the task and delivered. 

1. Max Verstappen

2025 position: 2^nd, 421 points  

Norris may be Champion, but without a shadow of doubt Max Verstappen was again the stand-out performer of the year. Bar one moment of reckless madness that was a significant contributory factor in the Red Bull driver not equalling Michael Schumacher's record of five consecutive titles, he delivered before the summer break with a car not worthy of some of his drives. Even more so after as the RB21's faults were rectified, he rattled off ten consecutive podiums, including six victories, to take it to the wire in Abu Dhabi.

That mad moment was, of course, when he decided to deliberately collide with nemesis George Russell during the Spanish Grand Prix, earning a ten-second penalty that relegated him from fifth to tenth at the chequered flag and cost him a decisive nine points. Aside from that, Verstappen was impeccable and imperious, and but for the poor performance of his car early on, which was his predominant downfall, we would be hailing him as a five-time World Champion right now.

Images courtesy of Getty Images.