Top 10 F1 cars: the most valuable grand prix machines ever sold

10. Williams FW14B

Year 1992 / Price $3.41m (£2.7m) 

One of the most distinctive grand prix designs of all time, the FW14B represents a golden era in Williams’ history, resplendent in its Canon/Camel colours. Designed by Adrian Newey, the car dominated the 1992 campaign, carrying British hero Nigel Mansell to his sole world title. Often known simply as ‘Red 5’ this chassis, FW14/08, was handled by Mansell for the opening five grands prix of the year, scoring pole position and victory in each of the races at South Africa, Mexico, Brazil, Spain and San Marino, giving Mansell five of the nine wins that would make him champion. Mansell’s team-mate Riccardo Patrese would drive it for the second half of the year, adding two further podium finishes and a win in Japan to the car’s record. Williams finished the season as Constructors’ champion, with a one-two in the drivers’ points. The car was bought by four-time F1 champion Sebastian Vettel during a Bonhams sale at the Goodwood Festival of Speed in 2019. Vettel has since conducted limited demo runs in the car, including running it on sustainable fuel at the 2022 British Grand Prix.

9. McLaren MP4/8A

Year 1993 / Price $4.79m (£3.64m)

Continuing the 1990s theme, McLaren’s MP4/8A is the only car in this list that was once driven by Ayrton Senna and, despite not being one of the Brazilian hero’s title-winners, stands as one of his most memorable. Senna campaigned chassis MP4/8-6 for the full season, celebrating five grand prix wins along the way, including home glory in Brazil and then that ‘lap of the gods’ moment at a drenched Donington Park where he drove arguably the greatest single lap in F1 history to crush his opposition, even setting a new lap record by speeding through the pits (legal at the time) as he’d worked out it acted as a short cut. Wily. A record-breaking sixth Monaco win followed, before a double in Japan/Australia, however Senna would wind up second to team-mate Alain Prost, making his ill-fated move to Williams the following season. Sold by Bonhams during the Les Grandes Marques Monaco event in 2018.

8. McLaren MP4-25A

Year 2010 / Price $6.53m (£4.73m)

Only one car here driven by Senna, yet this is the first of two handled by one of his biggest fans. This was one of the McLarens that helped put Sir Lewis Hamilton on the road to legendary status, and was the first ex-Hamilton car ever to be offered for public sale. Hamilton won the 2010 Turkish Grand Prix aboard chassis 25A-01, the first of his three wins that season. The car was also raced later in the year by then-reigning world champion, Jenson Button, who had moved to Woking after his sensational title-winning year with Brawn GP. After a complete overhaul by both McLaren Racing Heritage and Mercedes-AMG High Performance Powertrains, the car was offered in ready to run condition by RM Sotheby’s in 2021.

7. Ferrari F300

Year 1998 / Price $6.01m (£4.99m)

It may not have been a title-winner, but the F300 was arguably the first car in which Michael Schumacher showed the glimpses of the sort of dominance that would eventually help the German and Ferrari rule the sport… Well, at least so far as the points table goes. After his world title double with Benetton, Schumacher made the move to Maranello in 1996, claiming three wins and third in the world championship. While Schuey would be firmly in title contention in 1997 with five race wins, his decision to ram Jacques Villeneuve in the finale at Jerez led to him being disqualified from the points entirely. So, on to 1998 and the F300 where Schumacher piloted this chassis, number 187, to four of his eventual six wins (Canada, France, Britain and Italy). That run also gives the car the distinction of being the only grand prix racing Ferrari to have entered at least three events and won every single one. Schumacher would finish second to McLaren’s Mika Häkkinen in the points, but the tide would turn along with the century. This car was sold by RM Sotheby’s in Monterey in 2022.

6. Ferrari F2002

Year 2002 / Price $6.64m (£5.12m)

If the last car was the setup, this one was the undisputed evidence. By 2002 the Schumacher-Ferrari juggernaut was in full swing, and at no time were the effects of the partnership better displayed than with the F2002. Standing as one of the most successful grand prix cars of all-time, the design won 15 times from 19 grands prix between 2002-2003, scoring 11 pole positions and 15 fastest laps along the way. While Rubens Barrichello added four of those victories, the car was most potent with Schumacher installed as the German ace set a whole bunch of sporting benchmarks aboard the 3-litre V10-powered machine. He took a then-record 11 wins in a single season in 2002 (a title now held by Max Vertappen from 2023, but he had an extra five races in which to do so), won the title by the then-biggest margin ever (67pts) and was named champion earlier than anybody before, or since, as his record of having six of the 17 races left to run still stands. This specific chassis, 219, was taken to wins in San Marino, Austria and France and was sold by RM Sotheby’s in Abu Dhabi back in 2019.

5. Ferrari F2001

Year 2001 / Price $7.50m (£5.64m)

There must have been something in the air (or the drinks) in New York on November 16, 2017, when this superb example of a Ferrari world-beater crossed the block at an, erm, Contemporary Art Evening. Yep, you read that right. Among the Jackson Pollocks and David Hockneys came this highly random sale of an F2001. Well, it’s a form of art, right? At least it was in Schumacher’s hands, winning nine times that season, with this chassis topping the races at Monaco and Hungary. The winning bid of nearly £6m would have got you a couple of Jasper Johns or several Lucian Freuds, but was eventually dwarfed by the $32.4m sale of one of Andy Warhol’s portraits of Chairman Mao. We know which we’d have rather taken home.

4. Ferrari F2003-GA

Year 2003 / Price $14.7m (£12.7m)

The market clearly hungers for turn-of-the-century Ferraris, especially with ones linked to Schumacher. However the final Prancing Horse of this list does hold the distinction of being one of just four Ferrari chassis to have carried the sport’s all-time great to five or more victories. Chassis 229 was used by Schumacher to win the Spanish, Austrian, Canadian, Italian and United States grands prix on the way to his penultimate world title in 2003. Designed by Ferrari’s dream team of Rory Byrne and Ross Brawn, the car arrived mid-season with the GA suffix standing as a mark of respect to Gianni Agnelli, the recently deceased boss of Fiat. Not only did Schumacher put the new car on pole at Barcelona and win first time out, he doubled up next time around at the A1-Ring before totalling six wins in a season where he just pipped McLaren’s Kimi Räikkönen to the world title by two points. The car was sold during RM Sotheby’s Luxury Week event in Geneva in 2022.

3. Mercedes-AMG F1 W04

Year 2013 / Price $18.81m (£15.13m)

Step aside, Ferrari, the Silver Arrows are coming through, with the top three entries here all occupied by Mercedes-Benz, but from two very different eras. This 2013 F1 W04 shattered the record for being the most expensive modern grand prix car ever sold when it crossed the block at an RM Sotheby’s event ahead of the 2023 Las Vegas Grand Prix. Following his headline-grabbing switch from McLaren to a then-struggling Mercedes team, Lewis Hamilton scored his breakthrough win with this chassis in Hungary, sealing his first victory as a Silver Arrows driver. Four podium finishes brought him a (rather disappointing) fourth in the championship, but did set the ball rolling for what would become one of the sport’s all-time great partnerships when the V6 Hybrid rules arrived just a season later. This car is also the only ex-Hamilton Mercedes-AMG ‘out in the wild’ as a car not owned by the factory, team boss Toto Wolff or Hamilton himself.

2. Mercedes-Benz W196

Year 1954 / Price $29.8m (£19.60)

Twelve years after becoming the most valuable automobile of any kind to be sold at auction, W196 chassis 00006/54 has only just been pipped to the number one slot, emphasising quite how special a machine it is. Driven in period by Juan-Manuel Fangio, the car became the first open-wheel ‘slipper’-bodied Mercedes F1 model to score a grand prix victory in the post-war era when ‘The Maestro’ claimed victory in the 1954 German Grand Prix, a feat he quickly repeated in the Swiss GP a few weeks later. The results make chassis 00006 the only surviving W196 to have won two world championship grands prix. Last driven in period by Karl Kling at Monza in 1955, the car was then consigned to the Daimler-Benz Museum in Stuttgart and used for display and fleeting demonstration purposes before passing into a private collection. As the only W196 in private ownership, it hammered down at Bonhams’ Goodwood Festival of Speed auction in 2013 at a then-world-record £19.6m. While other road cars have since surpassed that, W196 stood as the most valuable grand prix machine up until 2025.

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