Which country has produced the most F1 world champions?

Aptly for a country that still prided itself on fair play, Hawthorn’s victory was assured thanks to Stirling Moss’s sportsmanship. He stood up for his title rival who was threatened with disqualification after spinning in the Portuguese GP and allegedly turning his car around on track against the flow of cars. Moss said that the turn had been made on an escape road, and Hawthorn kept his second position and points. He won the title by a single point.

The floodgates were open (but not, famously, for Moss). Over the next two decades, a run of British world champions began with Graham Hill (1962 and 1968), then Jim Clark (1963 and 1965), John Surtees (1964), Jackie Stewart (1969, 1971 and 1973) and James Hunt (1976).

British teams McLaren and Williams were in crushing form in the 1980s, but their winning drivers heralded from elsewhere. It took Nigel Mansell to end the drought in 1992, in the all-conquering Williams FW14B, clinching the title with five rounds to spare. He was followed by Damon Hill in ’96, also at Williams.

There have been three British world champions in the 21st century, marked by Hamilton’s supremacy. He won his fist championship in 2008, and was then succeeded by Jenson Button the following year, with a Brawn team that had risen from the ashes of Honda.

Five years on and Hamilton, now at Mercedes, began a remarkable run of winning six championships in seven years.

Had it not been for the controversy of Abu Dhabi in 2021, he would have added another title to his collection. For now he remains level with Schumacher on seven world championships.

If Hamilton is to win again with Ferrari, he’ll have Britain’s latest world champion to beat: Lando Norris showed his pace and resilience in 2025, and will be looking to defend his title in 2026.

2. Germany
12 drivers’ world championships

Despite a host of pre-war superstars, Germany didn’t have a drivers’ world champion until 1994, but some exceptional talents soon put the country on the Formula 1 map.

The arrival of Michael Schumacher shook up more than just the national championship table. His instinctive speed and ruthless competitiveness earned him two titles for Benetton in the mid-1990s before he set out on a mission that has proved impossible for many of the series’ greats.

Joining a Ferrari team that hadn’t won a championship since 1979, Schumacher — with team boss Jean Todt and technical director Ross Brawn — revived its fortunes and won five straight championships with the team from 2000. But for a broken leg at Silverstone in 1999, it could have been seven.

A first retirement dawned for Schumacher but his mantle was taken on by Sebastian Vettel, who won at Monza in his debut 2008 season and, by the end of 2010, was world champion. He would go on to win four consecutive titles but couldn’t imitate his hero, Schumacher, in winning more when he moved to Ferrari.

If it wasn’t for Lewis Hamilton, then Nico Rosberg might merit more than just a paragraph, but the son of world champion Keke Rosberg had the misfortune to race alongside one of the greatest drivers in history. That he beat the seven-time world champion to the title in 2016 is a mark of just how good he was, but the effort proved all-encompassing, and he retired rather than repeat that level of dedication for another year.

3. Brazil
8 world championships

Brazil has a history of producing legendary drivers but it has now been three-and-a-half decades since one of them claimed an F1 title.

The first Brazilian champion was Emerson Fittipaldi in 1972, who won in the innovative Lotus 72 car which introduced the wedge shape to F1.

This was the second time the Lotus 72 had won the championship, after Jochen Rindt in ’70, and Fittipaldi followed that up with a second title two years later.

It was just a prelude to the 1980s where the green, yellow and blue flag would regularly fly aloft at the top of grand prix podiums.

The first Brazilian F1 star of the decade was Nelson Piquet who won his first of three championships in the dramatic final race of 1981, held in the car park of Caesars Palace casino, Las Vegas.

Championship leader Carlos Reutemann looked to be favourite as he started on pole, But the Williams drier mysteriously slipped back during the race and finished eighth. It meant that Piquet’s fifth position was enough to claim his first title, which was followed up with a second two years later and a third in 1987.

The next year Piquet was superseded in more ways than one as an even greater Brazilian star took his first Formula 1 world championship. Ayrton Senna beat McLaren team-mate Alain Prost by three points that year in the celebrated MP4/4, and the list of F1 greats gained a new addition.

Having lost his title at Suzuka in 1989, when Alain Prost cynically caused a collision that made him champion, Senna dealt out similar treatment in 1990 when he had the upper hand.

If both drivers retired, then Senna would be champion and so, when Prost beat polesitter Senna off the line, helped by being on the cleaner side of the track, Senna simply speared into him at the first corner, sending both cars out of the race in a cloud of gravel trap dust.

Senna beat the ascendant Williams in 1991 for his third title, and would surely have won more without the tragic 1994 San Marino Grand Prix that claimed his life.

Felipe Massa came close to becoming the fourth Brazilian F1 champion in 2008 but, in front of his home crowd, he lost out by one point after Lewis Hamilton made a title-deciding overtake on Timo Glock for P5 in the final corner of the final lap.

4. Argentina
5 world championships

Every one of Argentina’s world championships has come courtesy of one driver: the great Juan Manuel Fangio.

Dubbed El Maestro, Fangio became the second driver to win the world championship clinching the title at the final round of the 1951 season.

After a couple of years missing out, he then gave F1 its first era of true dominance by winning four straight titles between 1954 and 1957.

The first of that run has to be his most impressive after Fangio won six of the nine rounds that season, standing on the podium seven times in total, despite skipping the second ’round; of the season at the Indianapolis 500, which was then included on the F1 calendar but entered by few F1 drivers.

The closest Argentina has come to a champion since then is Reutemann, who was runner-up to Piquet in 1981.

Currently, however, the only Argentinian in the top categories of single seater racing is 19-year-old Franco Colapinto, who is ninth in the Formula 3 championship at the time of writing.

5. Finland, Australia, Austria, France and the Netherlands
4 world championships each

Australia was first of the four to produce a world champion with Jack Brabham claiming back-to-back titles in 1959 and ’60.

He then won a third in 1966 where four consecutive race wins in the core of the season, helping him to have it wrapped up with two rounds to spare.

14 years later, Alan Jones became the next Aussie to win the championship who in 1980, also becoming the first Williams driver to clinch the F1 title.

Jones is also the last Australian to become world champion but the country has still had great drivers since then with Mark Webber and Daniel Ricciardo both becoming race winners.

However, Australia also has hot prodigy Oscar Piastri who is touted, by many, as a future F1 champion after he won Formula Renault, F3 and F2 all in consecutive years.

After Australia, Austria then became the next country here to produce a world champion with Jochen Rindt winning in 1970.

However, that title win is also famous for the fact Rindt is the first and only driver to clinch the championship posthumously, after he died in a crash at Monza with three rounds to spare.

The ‘70s was a successful decade for Austria in F1 though, with Niki Lauda making his debut in the sport in ’71, before winning his first championship four years later.

The Austrian could have made it back-to-back titles had it not been for his infamous crash at the Nurburgring in ’76 – him leading the standings at that point – which caused him to miss the next two rounds, but he followed that up with a second championship in 1977.

After deciding to retire at the end of the 1979 season, Lauda came back in 1982, winning a third and final championship in ’84, which was his penultimate year in F1.

The year Lauda returned, though, was the season Finland had its first champion with Keke Rosberg clinching the title at the final round, despite only winning one race all season.

The Scandinavian country has since had two more world champions with Mika Häkkinen winning back-to-back for McLaren in 1998 and ’99, while still to this day, Kimi Räikkönen is the last driver to have won a championship for Ferrari in 2007.

The final country to produce world championships is France which, like Argentina, has a lot of titles but it’s all come via one driver.

Prost dominated the 1985 season to clinch his first title with two rounds to spare, while he then made it back-to-back championships after Mansell had a tyre blowout at Adelaide the following year.

He was caught up in the intense rivalry with new McLaren team-mate Senna, managing to pip the Brazilian to the championship in ’89 at the penultimate round in Japan.

It was decided in controversial circumstances at the final chicane in Suzuka, as Senna made a dive-bomb down the inside but with Prost still turning into him, causing them both to halt at the escape road.

Prost retired from the race while Senna continued with damage knowing if he stopped, Prost would have become champion.

After rejoining via the escape road and then pitting, Senna worked his way back up to win the race but immediately afterwards he was disqualified for allegedly missing the chicane.

McLaren and Senna furiously appealed the decision, but the FIA did not change its stance and Prost became world champion.

Prost then won his fourth and final championship in 1993, but became the sixth driver in F1 to not defend their crown as he retired immediately afterwards.

Despite not winning a title since, France still have race-winners on the current grid with Pierre Gasly and Esteban Ocon, while Frenchman Theo Pourchaire, 18, is second in F2 and is tipped as a future F1 driver.

The Netherlands joined the four-title group when Verstappen claimed his country’s first F1 world title in 2021, besting Lewis Hamilton in a remarkable championship fight.

After a season-long battle, the two then entered the 22nd and final round level on points in a winner takes all matchup in Abu Dhabi. But just when it looked like Hamilton was cruising to a record-breaking eighth world title, Nicholas Latifi crashed his Williams in the final sector, causing a safety car. Mercedes failed to pit Hamilton, while Red Bull brought Verstappen in for fresh tyres.

While the damage was being cleared, there were five lapped cars between Hamilton and Verstappen who initially got told that they weren’t allowed to unlap themselves under the safety car. But on the penultimate lap, the decision was reversed and those five were told that they could unlap themselves, while the lapped cars behind Verstappen could not do so — despite the rules stipulating if one does it, all have do it.

The race then restarted the next lap and, on fresher tyres, Verstappen was able to take advantage of the vulnerable Hamilton to win the championship on the final lap.

Verstappen’s title triumphs since then have been much less controversial, as the Dutchman stormed to victory by record-breaking margins in 2022 and 2023. Verstappen secured his fourth consecutive title in 2024, a feat which cemented his name amongst the very best drivers F1 has ever seen.

Ninth – Italy (3 world championships)

Despite its rich history in motorsport through Ferrari, Italy has been starved of recent success via a driver.

In the 21st century, only two Italians, Giancarlo Fisichella and Jarno Trulli, have won a F1 race while one has to date all the way back to the ‘50s for the nation’s last champion.

In fact, three of the opening four F1 seasons were won by an Italian driver with Giuseppe Farina becoming the first-ever world champion in 1950. He pipped Fangio to the title by three points, clinching the championship at the final round by winning in front of his home crowd at Monza. After Fangio managed to get his first the following year, Italian Alberto Ascari then won back-to-back championships in ’52 and ’53.

Both were done in a dominant fashion with the first being clinched with two rounds to spare, winning five of the eight races that year. Ascari then sealed his second championship in ’53 by winning the Swiss Grand Prix in the penultimate round of the season.

Joint-tenth – United States and Spain (2 world championships each)

America has had a very inconsistent relationship with F1 through the years.

It produced a world champion early on, then went through various long stints without hosting a race, but from 2023 the country will have three Grands Prix on the calendar.

The first American to win the championship was Phil Hill in 1961, who won for Ferrari by just one point.

Mario Andretti was the next American win the title in 1978 who, at the time of writing, is its last to become world champion.

He did it driving for Lotus, where six wins in the first 14 races helped him clinch the title with two rounds to spare.

Currently, America has Logan Sargeant, 21, who is third in F2, while highly rated IndyCar star Colton Herta is looking for a way into F1.

With that in mind, will America end its 44-year stint without a F1 world championship anytime soon?

Alongside USA on this list is Spain, who has won two world titles thanks to Fernando Alonso.

He won his titles back-to-back for Renault in 2005 and ’06, which brought an end to the dominance of Schumacher and Ferrari.

Despite his immense talent, a series of bad luck and poor career choices means Alonso is yet to win a third world title.

He lost out by one point in 2007, while taking Vettel to the final race in 2010 and ’12 to eventually lose out both times.

A move to McLaren during the hybrid era brought great hope but that reunion was ultimately a disaster with the British outfit failing to produce a car nor Honda an engine capable of matching Alonso’s talent.

Now at the age of 41 and stuck fighting in the midfield, Spain’s biggest hope of another world championship is through Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz, who this year won his first race in F1.

Joint-twelfth – New Zealand, South Africa and Canada (1 world championship each) 

Finally to the bottom of this list where four nations have all collected one world championship each.

New Zealand were the first here to do so with Denny Hulme winning the 1967 championship for Brabham.

Next was South Africa, who had Jody Scheckter winning the 1979 title for Ferrari, while Canada then finally had a world champion in 1997.

After a successful career in American open wheel racing, winning a title in 1995, Jacques Villeneuve then came to F1 for the 1996 season.

He finished runner up in his rookie season before going one better the following year, clinching the title at the final round after a long, intense battle against Schumacher.

But still to this day, Villeneuve is the last non-European driver to have won the F1 world championship.