2024 driver rankings: Was anyone better than Verstappen?

It's that time of year again: a chance to divide opinion and awaken the trolls by ranking the top 10 drivers of the Formula 1 season.

We've attempted to remove car performance from the equation and focus on each driver's year relative to expectations. This is not a list based on career achievements, and certainly not a list based on future potential -- this top 10 is purely down to how F1's class of 2024 performed across this season.

10. Pierre Gasly | Alpine

Gasly's place on this list is largely thanks to his strong finish to the season. That's not to say his performance at the start of the year was bad, it's just that Alpine's lack of performance made it incredibly difficult to judge.

When the car finally became a contender for top-10 finishes, Gasly took advantage with four points hauls at the final five rounds, including his part in Alpine's memorable double podium in Brazil. Over the course of the year, he narrowly outqualified teammate Esteban Ocon (16-13 over qualifying and sprint qualifying), but it was his third-place grid position in Las Vegas that stood out as something truly special.

9. Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes

British Grand Prix victory aside, Hamilton's final year with Mercedes did not go to plan. Struggles with the car over a single flying lap saw him squarely beaten by teammate George Russell in qualifying and finish seventh overall in the championship standings -- his worst classification in his 18-year career.

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But even Hamilton's bad seasons are still better than most drivers' best, and among his two victories, three additional podium finishes and a charge through the field at the final round in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, there were signs of the Hamilton of old. As he said midway through a particularly disappointing weekend in Qatar, he's "still got it." It's just that it wasn't always evident throughout the 2024 season.

8. Nico Hülkenberg | Haas

One of the success stories of the 2024 season was Haas' elevation from the foot of the constructors' standings to seventh, and Hülkenberg played a big role in that progression.

He scored points at 12 of the 24 rounds and made the top 10 on the grid on 11 occasions. What's more, he finished in 11th place seven times, underlining consistency across the year that wasn't quite reflected in his final points tally.

A podium finish remains elusive for Hülkenberg, but, based on 2024, given a front-running car it would likely become routine.

7. Fernando Alonso | Aston Martin

When Alonso finally hangs up his helmet at the end of his F1 career, 2024 will not stand out as a memorable season. Yet it seems there's no such thing as a bad year for Alonso in F1, and his efforts, which ultimately secured Aston Martin a comfortable fifth place in the constructors' standings, are worth recognition on this list.

Throughout 2024, the performance of Alonso's car was going backward compared to his rivals, but he continued to score points when they were on offer -- right up until the final two rounds. The trend of Aston Martin's year meant 33 of his 70 points were scored at the first six races. Although teammate Lance Stroll scored zero points at the final 11 races, Alonso still picked up 25. He also had 16 Q3 appearances in a car that often had no place in the top 10.

6. Oscar Piastri | McLaren

Given his age and inexperience in F1, there's actually a strong case to move Piastri further up this list. In only his second season, Piastri qualified on the front row of the grid six times and took eight podiums, including two victories in Hungary and Azerbaijan.

During his peak performances, such as Hungary, Belgium and Italy, he seemed to hit a level even Lando Norris couldn't match, but he wasn't as consistent as his more experienced McLaren teammate across the entire season. By the end of the year, he was 82 points shy of Norris and ultimately that's why he ended up ranked outside the top five.

5. Carlos Sainz | Ferrari

Sainz's final season with Ferrari was arguably the best of his career. It was fitting that he signed off with two victories: one in Australia, coming just two weeks after he was forced to withdraw from the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix because of an appendicitis, and a second following a dominant showing in Mexico City.

Despite the appendicitis, his season started strongly with three podiums in his first three races and finished on a similar note with four podiums from his final six. But through the middle of the year -- when Ferrari struggled to make progress with its development -- he was unable to match Charles Leclerc, and in the final standings he was 66 points adrift of his teammate.

4. George Russell | Mercedes

No other teammate of Hamilton's has beaten the seven-time world champion as conclusively as Russell did this year. While it's true 2024 was not a vintage season for Hamilton, that shouldn't take away from the performance of Russell over the past 24 races.

Across sprint qualifying and grand prix qualifying combined, Russell beat Hamilton 24-6 this year, and the average qualifying gap was 0.17 seconds in Russell's favour. While Hamilton undoubtedly struggled to jell with this year's Mercedes, those are big numbers against a driver with a record 104 pole positions.

On points, Russell outscored Hamilton by 22, but that ignores the 25 points Russell lost (and 7 Hamilton gained) when Russell's car tipped the scales 3.3 pounds shy of the minimum weight following his victory at the Belgian Grand Prix. By all accounts, the difference in weight would have made minimal difference to Russell's performance at Spa, yet it deprived him a third victory in a car that was routinely fourth best over the course of the year.

3. Lando Norris | McLaren

The 2024 season was a breakthrough year for Norris in which he answered critics unfairly propagating his "Lando No-wins" nickname and found himself launching a surprise challenge for the title. For all the milestones broken in 2024, though, it was also a year of "what-ifs" for McLaren's lead driver.

What if he had held on to the lead after starting from pole position in Spain, Hungary and Italy? What if he pitted at the right time in Canada and Great Britain? What if it hadn't rained in Brazil? And what if he'd seen and reacted to the yellow flags in Qatar? Not all of those lost positions and points can be blamed on Norris, but there's enough there to wonder if the 2024 season was a big opportunity missed.

By his own admission, he was learning as he went during his first genuine title campaign, but unfortunately for Norris, he had a rival in Max Verstappen who would exploit every misstep. As a result, if Norris could rerun the season, he'd very likely do a better job the second time round. Hopefully he gets another chance in 2025.

2. Charles Leclerc

Consistency is not a word that has often been associated with Leclerc, but in 2024 he finished in the top four at 19 of the 24 races.

Serious hopes of a championship challenge faded when Ferrari lost the thread of its car development midseason -- resulting in three finishes outside the top 10 in the four races between Canada and Britain -- but Leclerc's end to the season was strong. So strong, in fact, that if you were to start every driver at zero after the summer break and run a 10-race mini championship, Leclerc would have emerged as champion ahead of Norris and Verstappen.

His three race victories (Monaco, Monza and Austin) were all a result of brilliant performances, but Monza was perhaps the most impressive. It was a race McLaren should have won, but Leclerc nursed his tyres (again, a trait not usually associated with the Ferrari driver) to secure a memorable victory on the team's home turf. If Ferrari's form continues into 2025, Leclerc has to be considered a favourite for the title.

1. Max Verstappen

Who else? Verstappen's fourth world championship may not have been as dramatic as his 2021 title nor as dominant as his 2023 season, but there's a strong argument to say that 2024 was his best year yet.

While it's true he had a dominant car at the first five races of the season, allowing him to build a healthy cushion of points, that period accounted for only four of his nine wins in 2024. The remaining five (still more than any other driver in 2024) came against stiff competition and often against the odds -- especially his epic drive in the wet in Brazil.

Verstappen never once finished outside the top six in a season when his teammate, Sergio Pérez, failed to break the top six on 17 occasions. The car was clearly difficult to drive, with a low point around the Italian Grand Prix, but he went on to win two more races after that (in Brazil and Qatar) after putting in the hours back at Red Bull's simulator to find a solution.

There were moments when his aggressive "racecraft" was called into question -- especially at the Mexico Grand Prix when he ran Norris off the road twice in one lap -- but his sheer speed and ability were never in doubt. Whatever you think of him, you'll struggle to argue there was a better driver than Verstappen in 2024.