The FIA has reportedly revised the number of stewards to serve at an F1 grand prix, with six to feature a higher number than the rest.

And, according to Autosport, the F1 2025 season-opening Australian Grand Prix will be the first to feature the expanded panel under this apparent new system.

New FIA steward panel approach to debut in Melbourne?

Stewards play a critical role in the operation of a Formula 1 race weekend, enforcing the FIA regulations, with the most recent system in use seeing a panel of four stewards selected for each event.

However, it is claimed that an update to the sporting regulations for F1 2025 will usher in change to that panel.

While previously, four stewards were on the panel at each race weekend – a former driver and one steward appointed by the national sporting authority overseeing that race weekend among the four – the majority of the grands prix in F1 2025 are now set to feature only three stewards, according to the report.

Meanwhile, there will be six race weekends where four stewards oversee the action, deemed ‘high workload’ events.

And the first of those will reportedly be the Australian Grand Prix which kicks-off F1 2025, while the remaining ones are the Chinese, Canadian, Singapore, Mexican and Brazilian GPs.

Autosport state that the FIA Sporting Regulations have duly been updated to reference the change and confirm that “a minimum of three and a maximum of four stewards, one of whom will be appointed chairman” will now serve at any given grand prix.

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The FIA stewarding panel has been a hot topic for debate over the winter after the governing body axed three-time race winner Johnny Herbert, citing a conflict of interest between the role and his F1 punditry work.

Herbert found himself clashing with Max and Jos Verstappen after criticism of the former at times in 2024 with his pundit hat on, while 1996 World Champion Damon Hill also attracted backlash for his criticism of Max – a four-time F1 World Champion – which included Hill likening him to Dick Dastardly, the villain from the Wacky Races cartoon.

Hill would depart Sky F1 following the 2024 campaign, having been a part of the broadcaster’s F1 line-up as a pundit since they took on the live broadcasting rights for the UK and Ireland in 2012, while their coverage is also simulcasted in key F1 markets like the United States.

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