The engine in a 2026 Formula 1 car is still a 1.6-litre V6 turbo, and almost everything else about it has changed. The electrical side has roughly tripled in output, an entire component has disappeared, the fuel is synthetic and the rules for developing it mid-season are new. Understanding the power unit is now essential to understanding the championship — because in 2026, the fastest car is largely the one with the best engine. Here is how it works.

The four components

A 2026 power unit has four main parts:

  • The internal combustion engine (ICE): a 1.6-litre V6 with a single turbocharger, producing roughly 400kW — around 540bhp — deliberately reduced from the previous generation.
  • The MGU-K: the Motor Generator Unit – Kinetic, an electric motor/generator on the crankshaft. Its maximum output rose from 120kW to 350kW, making it almost as powerful as the combustion engine.
  • The energy store: the battery, which holds the harvested energy and must accept far higher charge and discharge rates than before.
  • The turbocharger: now working without the electric assistance of the MGU-H, which means engineers had to solve turbo lag in other ways.

Why the MGU-H is gone

From 2014 to 2025, the MGU-H recovered energy from exhaust gases spinning the turbo and could also spin the turbo up to eliminate lag. It was brilliant engineering and horrendously complex, and it had no relevance to road cars. Removing it was the price of attracting new manufacturers: Audi entered F1 on the condition that the MGU-H went, and Red Bull was able to build its own powertrains division with Ford. The cost of losing it is the turbo-lag problem, which manufacturers now manage through combustion tuning and how they use the MGU-K to fill in torque.

Harvest and deploy

Under braking, the MGU-K acts as a generator, converting the car’s kinetic energy into electricity stored in the battery. Under acceleration it becomes a motor, adding its output to the combustion engine. The amount of energy that can be recovered per lap has roughly doubled compared with the old regulations, and the amount that can be deployed is correspondingly larger — which is why “energy management” now dominates how drivers approach a lap. On long straights the battery can run down before the braking zone, leaving the car on combustion power alone: the “low-battery racing” that shaped this year’s Italian Grand Prix.

Overtake Mode

With DRS gone, the attacking tool is a burst of extra electrical deployment available to a driver within range of the car ahead. Because it draws on the same finite battery, using it aggressively leaves less energy to defend. We cover the tactics in What is Overtake Mode?

Sustainable fuel

All 2026 cars run on 100% sustainable fuel: synthetic or biofuel produced from non-food biomass, municipal waste or carbon captured from the atmosphere, with no new fossil carbon. The fuel is formulated as a “drop-in” product, meaning it could in principle run in an ordinary road car, and Formula 1 sees it as its most important contribution to wider transport decarbonisation. Fuel flow is now regulated by energy rather than by mass, so fuel suppliers compete on how much energy they can pack into each litre within the rules — a new front in the engine war.

Who makes the engines

Five manufacturers supply the 2026 grid: Mercedes (Mercedes, McLaren, Williams, Alpine), Ferrari (Ferrari, Haas, Cadillac), Honda (Aston Martin), Red Bull Powertrains with Ford (Red Bull, Racing Bulls) and Audi (Audi). Cadillac uses Ferrari units while General Motors develops its own engine for later in the decade. As our engine war analysis explains, Mercedes built the benchmark unit and Ferrari has spent the season chasing a straight-line deficit.

The ADUO allowance

To prevent a manufacturer being locked into an uncompetitive engine for years, the 2026 rules include a structured allowance for in-season development — ADUO — that permits manufacturers behind the benchmark to introduce defined upgrades during the year. Ferrari used two such steps in 2026. The allowance has created a live competitive dynamic that did not exist under the old freeze, and disputes over how the FIA accounts for it have already surfaced.

Reliability and allocation

Each driver receives a fixed season allocation of every major component — ICE, turbo, MGU-K, energy store, control electronics — and exceeding it brings grid penalties. Managing that allocation across a 23-race calendar is a strategic exercise in itself: teams will sometimes take a penalty deliberately at a circuit where overtaking is easy to gain a fresh engine for the races that matter.

Frequently asked questions

How much power does a 2026 F1 engine produce?

Around 1,000 horsepower in total, split close to 50/50 between the V6 (roughly 400kW) and the MGU-K (up to 350kW).

What is the MGU-K?

The electric motor/generator on the crankshaft that harvests energy under braking and deploys it for extra power. Its output was almost tripled for 2026.

Why was the MGU-H removed?

It was complex, expensive and irrelevant to road cars; removing it simplified the engines and attracted Audi and Red Bull Powertrains with Ford.

What fuel do 2026 F1 cars use?

100% sustainable fuel made from non-food biomass, waste or captured carbon.