Ferrari is not planning to bring any EVO Joker updates for its 499P Hypercar in 2026 and instead will focus on working on areas of the car that can be updated without impacting the car’s performance.
The Italian brand has, of course, enjoyed a hugely successful 2025 so far in the FIA WEC, winning four of the six races so far this season, including the Le Mans 24 Hours for a third straight year.
As such, it would be a tall order for Ferrari to successfully argue with the FIA and ACO that it should be allowed to bring an EVO Joker that improves the 499P’s performance for the 2026 season. Though Porsche, which won the 2024 Hypercar World Endurance Drivers’ Championship with its #6 crew, was granted permission to bring EVO Jokers for the 963 this season.
“I think the plan didn’t change,” Mauro Barbieri, Ferrari’s endurance race cars performance simulation and regulation manager, told reporters at CoTA. “We’re working on trying to improve our weaknesses. In some cases, as usual, you can do something without spending any Jokers, but in some other areas, you need to.
“But so far, we are, let’s say, happy with the performance, and we don’t see the need to introduce a Joker at the end of the year to race it in 2026.
“We introduced our first Joker about one year ago (at São Paulo, which focused on brake cooling and aero balance). We just did one full championship with it, and we’re quite happy with where we are. There’s no huge need for anything.”
A number of Ferrari’s competitors in Hypercar are expected to bring significant updates for next season as they look to close the gap to the ‘Prancing Horse’. Alpine, BMW and Cadillac from the pool of LMDh manufacturers have made their intentions clear, with all three developing revised aero packages for their cars.
And Barbieri admits that 2026 is a logical time to bring upgrades because every car in the Hypercar class will need to be taken to the Windshear wind tunnel for homologation in the off-season.
“It’s an opportunity,” he said. “Probably some competitors will do something. But we’ll see. We’ll see next year in Qatar how the cars will look, and how many brought aero updates.”
