How much do F1 drivers make per season?

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Take a look at how much your favorite F1 drivers make in a season

Formula One is the highest level of motorsports in the world. It is an open secret that F1 involves a lot of money and some of it’s racers are even considered to be among the highest earning athletes in the world. In this article we will focus on exactly that and find out how much are the F1 drivers making per season.

Coming up with exact figures of how much a racer is making per season is hard because the F1 drivers’ contract include performance based bonuses. The better a driver performs, the better his chances of securing a ton of money gets.

Unlike most of the sports across the world, F1 does not have a salary cap. Which means F1 teams are free to spend as much as they want on their drivers. They did introduce a performance cost cap in 2021, however, it has nothing to do with wages.

Lewis hamilton turkish GP
Lewis Hamilton is the highest paid F1 racer (Getty)

If we talk about the highest paid Formula One racer in the world, Lewis Hamilton is estimated to be the highest paid racer for the current season bagging in roughly $30 million. The Brit is the highest paid racer which also adds him to the list of highest paid athletes in the world. Hamilton is eight highest paid athlete for the year 2021 falling just behind the tennis superstar Roger Federer.

While Hamilton is making big bucks, it is not the same for everyone. Rookies like Yuki Tsunoda take home not even 5% of what the seven time world champion is making. For the 2021 season, Tsunoda’s earnings are considered to be somewhere around $500,000 which makes him the lowest paid Formula One racer.

Max Verstappen had to use the shoes of Sergio Perez at the Azerbaijan GP
Max Verstappen (Getty Images)

Max Verstappen on the other hand falls just below Hamilton. The Dutch racer is reportedly earning around $25 million. It is worth noting that Verstappen is only 24 years old and his wages will surely see new heights in the future.

Wages of every F1 racer for the 2021 season

Below you can have a look at the reported wages of every F1 racer for the 2021 season:

F1 RacerTeamWage
Lewis HamiltonMercedes$30 Million
Valtteri BottasMercedes$10 Million
Max VerstappenRed Bull$25 Million
Sergio PerezRed Bull$8 Million
Daniel RicciardoMcLaren$15 Million
Lando NorrisMcLaren$5 Million
Sebastian VettelAston Martin$15 Million
Lance StrollAston Martin$10 Million
Esteban OconAlpine$5 Million
Fernando AlonsoAlpine$20 Million
Carlos Sainz JnrFerrari$10 Million
Charles LeclercFerrari$12 Million
Yuki TsunodaAlphaTauri$0.5 Million
Pierre GaslyAlphaTauri$5 Million
Kimi RaikkonenAlfa Romeo$10 Million
Antonio GiovinazziAlfa Romeo$1 Million
Mick SchumacherHaas$1 Million
Nikita MazepinHaas$1 Million
Nicholas LatifiWilliams$1 Million
George RussellWilliams$1 Million
Tsunoda header
Yuki Tsunoda earns the least money in F1 as of now (Getty)

It is evident why Formula One racers are some of the highest paid athletes in the world. Every single racer in earning multi-millions each year except for Tsunoda who is in the early stages of his career.

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