The 23-year-old was on the pace all Saturday at the Red Bull Ring, progressing cleanly through each stage of qualifying and finishing as the highest-placed Red Bull-affiliated driver.
The Kiwi wound up behind pole winner Lando Norris, Charles Leclerc, Oscar Piastri, Lewis Hamilton, and Canadian Grand Prix winner George Russell.
Verstappen could only manage seventh, while Hadjar missed Q3 for the first time since Miami and will start 13th.
The driver who replaced Lawson at the senior Red Bull team earlier this year, Yuki Tsunoda, failed to escape Q1 for the third time in five races, ending the session in 18th.
Lawson’s result marked his best grid position of the season and the second-best qualifying performance of his F1 career, behind only his P5 start at the 2024 Sao Paulo Grand Prix.
The Kiwi said he was thrilled with the result.
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“I’ve never seen such a close qualifying before, so it’s nice to be on the right side of it this time,” he said.
“We’ve had the pace over the last few races, but today it finally clicked and we managed to put it all together.
“The team has done a fantastic job, especially everyone on my side of the garage who’ve been working incredibly hard.
“Tomorrow is when it really counts. It’s going to be a tough race with the field so tightly packed, and we’ll do our best to keep the competition behind us.”
The result is a welcome boost for Lawson, who has been hunting for consistency after a rocky start to the year.
He began the season alongside Verstappen at Red Bull, but after struggling in Australia and China was moved back to the Racing Bulls team.
Since then, he’s played second fiddle to rookie teammate Hadjar, outqualified by the Frenchman at every round except Saudi Arabia prior to Austria, and trailing him by 17 points in the standings.
Still, Lawson said he’s confident of adding to his points tally in Sunday’s race.
“The strategy remains quite open, we will work hard overnight to put the plan together,” he said.
“My focus will be on getting a clean start and making the right decisions in the car.”
The Austrian Grand Prix gets underway at 11pm AEST.
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