First pictures: Mercedes reveals its new F1 car for 2021

2021 F1 season

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Mercedes has revealed the W12, its new car for the 2021 F1 season, which the team hope will continue its record-breaking run of championship success.

The car, which Lewis Hamilton will drive as he bids to become the first Formula 1 driver to win an eighth world championship, is officially known as the Mercedes-AMG F1 W12 E Performance. Valtteri Bottas remains as Hamilton’s team mate for the fifth year in a row. Between them the pair won 13 of last year’s 17 races.

Last year Mercedes launched its car in a traditional silver livery. However by the time the much-delayed season began the team broke with that convention and introduced a new black livery bearing the message ‘end racism’, reflecting the team’s commitment to promoting diversity. The substantially black colour scheme has been retained for the new season.

Mercedes has undergone a significant change in its ownership structure since the end of last year. Daimler has reduced its share in the team to one-third, which is matched equally by CEO Toto Wolff and petrochemicals manufacturer Ineos, which arrived as a sponsor last year.

Wolff says the team is still as hungry for more success as it was when he joined it eight years ago.

“Every year we reset our focus and define the right objectives,” said Wolff. “That may sound
simple but it’s damn hard and is probably why there are no sports teams out there with seven
consecutive titles. So many things can happen and it’s very natural to get used to success, and
therefore not fight as hard for it.

“But this team has not shown any of that. I see the same fire, hunger and passion now as I did the
first time I walked through the doors in 2013. Every season presents a new challenge and therefore, a
new goal for us to achieve.”

Pictures: 2021 Mercedes W12

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Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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58 comments on “First pictures: Mercedes reveals its new F1 car for 2021”

  1. Well, can’t say that AMG as a logo works quite as classy, timeless and well as the Mercedes stars for me. I do like the black with the turqoise, and the lines don’t appear bad, while the one thing the AMG does is that it integrates better with the INEOS block, which now also works better with the straight black line and then grey/silver, seems a lot more cohesive there (though again, the AMG works better together there by it being less classy so yeah).

    1. I think the AMG logos would clearly stand out more if they had put them gray/silver on a BLACK background though.

      1. Yep, that too @bascb

  2. Genuinely don’t know what the designer was thinking fading that silver bit into it, laying on loads of AMG logos, and then a 44 on top for good measure. Horrific.

    1. Yup, that bit is awful.

    2. Was thinking the same… That weird grey AMG 44 bit at the end of the engine cover just ruined the look of a car that has been consistently beautiful over the past 8 seasons.

      1. @todfod Agree about the beautiful look over the past 8 seasons, and for me it is not just the ‘weird grey AMG 44 bit at the end of the engine cover,’ but the whole thing looks like a mess to me. I think it will probably look a bit better when racing on track out in the daylight, but still…yuk!

        1. @robbie

          Forgot to mention the dual colour tone on the front wing.. That looks pretty silly as well. Guess they really didn’t put any time or effort in to aesthetics this year.

    3. @cduk_mugello Yeah the AMG spam in particular is awful. The red from the Ineos logo looks like it should extend across the whole fin or made to fit the shape somehow, rather than stopping randomly at an angle. Then the car number should be filled in, written in white if it was on a black background but full red would be fine on the silver background. Other than that, I quite like the black and turquoise colour scheme and a few red highlights work well too.

    4. Yup – I’ll take the stars over this…

  3. Mercedes-AMG-AMG-AMG-AMG-AMG-AMG-AMG-AMG-AMG-AMG F1 W12 E Performance.

    1. I like it all except the red and silver bits. Im white 39yo, and im glad they are continueing the #blm livery with the only black driver on the grid (who is not my favourite driver btw) .

    2. ^Mercedes(-AMG)*\sF1\sW12\sE\sPerformance$

  4. Definitely can see how Mercedes are wanting to distance themselves from Formula 1 over time – Another season or 2 and I don’t think we’ll be seeing any 3 pointed stars on the car (which will probably be an “AMG Ineos Wolff Racing” branded machine.

    1. Speculatuon is F1 fans best hobby. I’m sure one said the same about Red Bull and Infiniti in 2013.
      Enjoy the present, the future isn’t guaranteed.

      1. Though the Red Bull had gotten more and more purple haze @jeff1s, and clearly, with only the Mercedes star on the nose left and the AMG taking quite a notable presence, @joeypropane does have a point. Personally, I like the Turqoise treatment, the front looks great, and the INEOS – black slanted line and then grey with AMG in same slant is a lot more cohesive than last year. Like the driver’s numbers fitting in (though maybe those should add a bit of weight to their lines to be better visible?), but it’s clearly not as classy as they way those stars blended in, and looks too busy, and indeed a hint of HAAS, which isn’t great.

    2. @joeypropane

      While the “Wolff” name is unlikely to feature in the title name, I agree with you with respect to Mercedes distancing themselves. I believe Mercedes effectively said this last season.

      Mainstream car manufacturers will not want to associated with ICE technology, as it doesn’t bode well with the “green” credentials that is requirement in today’s market. The 2022 grid, sans Honda, reads Ferrari, Mercedes/AMG, Aston Martin, Red Bull (powered by Red Bull), Alpine, Mclaren, whatever Sauber is called, Haas, Williams. The odd one out is Mercedes, as they’re mainstream brand in this context. F1 is/will become a space to market niche/high performance brands as they are currently exempt (somehow) from the watchful eyes of the Ministry of Green.

  5. That’s the 2013 Jazeman Jaafar Formulât Renault 3.5 in black here.

    F1 liveries are as beautiful as their launches nowadays.

  6. How to keep eveyone satisfied and make an absolute mess of it. They couldn’t ditch the black livery after one year but Toto has already said they’ll return to silver from the next year (maybe one of the hints of Lewis’ future?) and the in-between product just looks bad. The engine cover is horrendous from the designer perspective. The lesser half of this season’s of liveries for me, but I have no doubts it’ll be quick.

  7. Ben (@scuderia29)
    2nd March 2021, 10:53

    All those amg badges and the font of the 44..no no no, there must have a better solution when attempting to incorporate some silver back in

    1. Stephen Higgins
      2nd March 2021, 11:30

      I think they could have brought back some silver under the Petronas stipes along the sidepods and the monocoque. Maybe even faded into the black at the tip of the nose.

  8. The back of the car reminds me of a HAAS, with the black/grey/white/red all mixed together… Although I prefer the front of the car this year and the INEOS logos.

    But overall, I’m not really a fan… I much prefer the silver car of old!

  9. Does it look like this car is leaving the silvergrey of Mercedes behind …

    Overall, that car looks slick, and it will probably be incredibly fast again. The front is well done and they did do a better job at the Ineos this time. But that grey :-(

    1. The team, ever since it’s return in 2010 has had a bit of a fetish for awkward silver/grey to black transitions, guess they took up that tradition again @bascb :)

  10. Tech nerds… Is this a high rake car? Initial impression is that the rake has been increased. Or maybe it’s just me?

    1. No it’s not a high rake car. The angle of the photos and the cut-back section of the floor (2021 rules) can give that impression, though.

  11. A decent livery.

  12. Those bulges on the engine cover below the INEOS branding, are they new? Is this even tighter packaging around the PU or the PU architecture shifting a bit?

  13. What an ugly mess!

  14. Messy.
    Looks like two different cars combined in one

  15. Nice to see the three pointed star in Red is still there near the cockpit.

  16. Those AMG logos seem to be made by a kid who discovered the magic of Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V on a keyboard.

    On the tech-side, what is the end plate on that rear wing. Looks quite different to last year, doesn’t it?

  17. Overall, I like it. The grey AMG fest will still need some time to grow on me though.
    But most importantly of all, the red star is kept – repect. That’s the only thing that really matters, it wouldn’t have been a car without it.

  18. Oskari Kantonen
    2nd March 2021, 12:07

    Why have they made it purposefully difficult to read the number? The FIA made some teams make their numbers clearer in 2017 IIRC but since then the numbers have gotten worse again on a number of cars. The new AlphaTauri has the number so far up the nose you can’t see it from head on to name one.

    1. I agree, the driver’s number should be more bold. Rule 9.2 on page 6 of the Sporting Regulations includes this statement, “This number must be clearly visible from the front of the car and on the driver’s crash helmet.” I don’t know why there isn’t a rule stating the number has to be clearly visible on the side of the car as well, but I suppose everyone is happy with the status quo. Since one could argue there’s no rule that says a car has to have the driver’s number on its side, then it isn’t against the rules to have the 44 (or 77 or 35) so it is easily obscured by the “AMG” logos. However the front the number is hidden amongst the cooling vents, halo, radio aerials, etc, so that does look it could be the subject of a protest.

  19. Looks great but I am missing readable old style numbers on the modern racing machines.

  20. Chris Horton
    2nd March 2021, 13:10

    Toto is as hungry as 8 years ago for success.

    So, you want a bar of chocolate. You’d love a bar of chocolate. After the 7th bar, does anyone want an 8th as much as the first?

    Rhetorical question. Bore off.

  21. OMG

    1. The number 44 is very hard to read. Why not make it solid-ineos-red?
    2. The petronas-green boomerang on the halo is a nice touch.
    3. The AMG pattern has a certain eighties vibe to it. Not sure what to think of it.
    4. I’d make the air intake silver with the ineos brand in red.

    1. Jockey Ewing
      2nd March 2021, 13:37

      Very much agreed with 1. I think the job with the AMG logos ended up so badly, that the confusement led to one additional fail.

  22. Jockey Ewing
    2nd March 2021, 13:36

    Actually the more I look at it, the more I like it. It’s not a bad feat as I never really liked the Petronas-green as a color.

    Based on the image from 1 or 2 days before, I expected a bit more silver on the rear. And it looks like, it’s not only me to not really like the job with the AMG logos around the engine cover. Probably the AMG logos could be “inverted” so keep all the silver as it is, but have plain black AMG logos, so as a cutout text. This way they would stand out, but imo in a prettier way.
    Or further reduce the opacity all of the AMG logos, to make them less stand out, for example by 30 to 60%. This would make some of them very subtle, and as white not looks very good on silver I would not mind the most standout ones going subtle as well.

    Generally I like black-green split of color on the front wing, and the green on the car’s side looks really wild from the front view.

    1. Jockey Ewing
      2nd March 2021, 13:40

      And probably I would have more silver at the rear. Generally I would have more, but not at the front, because that would resemble the McLaren liveries from the years of Hakkinen, Kimi, etc.

  23. I prefer black over silver any day, and I think the turquoise stripe looks good along with the Ineos red. Overall, a mean looking car – and intended to look mean and confident, which I guess is kind of ominous for rivals.

  24. pastaman (@)
    2nd March 2021, 13:58

    I had a one in three chance of clicking on the first image in the gallery, but I still ended up in the middle LOL. Image gallery fail and subsequent clicks lost.

  25. I liked the star emblems better than the AMG logos.

    1. I love it. Glad they kept the black, glad to see Niki’s star, not anticipating any problem telling which driver is in front with the T-bar system, happy that so many find it irritating, a feeling that will likely grow when other teams fall flat again.

  26. For me, this is the best livery of any F1 car since the series begun!

    1. @lems Lol and wow. Wasn’t expecting a reaction like that, but hey, thank goodness we all have our own fingerprint, or wouldn’t life be boring.

  27. Niki Lauda’s red star kind of lost its meaning even thou it is basically only star there.

  28. I actually quite like it including the grey/silver on the fin. I have not always been a fan of the way the Merc looks either.

    Is it me or does this livery make the car look shorter than in previous years. Or is it in fact shorter?

  29. Stephen Higgins
    2nd March 2021, 15:12

    What does everyone think will be the impact of the loss of DAS on Merc this season ??

    1. The restarts after a safety car period will take them a little longer to get upto speed than previously but will be largely comparable with every other team. Overall the impact will be minimal and in fact as they have the weight back for ballast it might provide small advantages elsewhere.

  30. Ugly as yuck!

  31. I thought last year’s all-over merc logos was hideous, but the all-over AMG is far worse. I was really hoping they would return to the silver color. Before 2020 the mercedes was one of the better looking cars on the grid.

  32. This is the my current livery on Motorsport Manager game with Eastwood team. prnt.sc/10bhofb
    I think that I did a better job than these guys who get paid tons of money…

  33. AMG lettered logo times about 30 each, or more per car. Outdoing Ferrari with their lettering logo series M/MissionWinnow.

    Maybe each team can overlay their lettered logos all over the whole cars.

    Even though AMG is a car lettered logo. Not a smoking type logo. Oh well…

  34. Oh no. That AMG thing looks like a christmas paper. It is much more messy than last years car but is it as fast?

  35. ady (@sixwheeler)
    2nd March 2021, 19:48

    Black and turquoise, great but oh no, that silver fin! It is one colour too many on an otherwise nice combination

  36. Congratulation Mercedes for winning the 2021 drivers and constructors championships. Will be very exciting to watch you win and win and win and win and will never ever ever ever ever get boring.

Comments are closed.