The Monegasque driver took the lead from Kimi Antonelli off the line and held his advantage for much of the race, finishing 0.427s ahead of George Russell as the race ended behind the Safety Car after a late retirement for Max Verstappen’s.
The Dutchman appeared to lose control of his Red Bull entering Stowe just four laps from the end while running third, beaching his car in the gravel and creating a confusing Safety Car finish after it initially appeared set to come in with one lap remaining, only to stay out to the flag.
There was also late drama for Antonelli, who finished out of the points for the second time in the last three races after a wheel shield issue dropped him from second in the closing stages before a late penalty compounded his afternoon.
Lewis Hamilton finished third, although he was unlucky not to claim second behind his teammate, with Ferrari’s decision to pit him under the late Safety Car dropping him behind Russell, who stayed out.
Lando Norris made it three British drivers in the top four, finishing fourth, while teammate Oscar Piastri had a disastrous afternoon after suffering front wing damage on the opening lap, dropping to the rear of the field before recovering to 11th.
Isack Hadjar was fifth for Red Bull, while Liam Lawson equalled his best-ever Formula 1 finish by crossing the line sixth for his fifth consecutive points finish.
Teammate Arvid Lindblad made it another double-points finish for Racing Bulls in seventh, while Gabriel Bortoleto gave Audi its first points since the Australian Grand Prix in eighth.
The two Alpines of Franco Colapinto and Pierre Gasly rounded out the points in ninth and 10th respectively.
Leclerc’s win gives Ferrari its 250th victory in F1, while it was Leclerc’s first win since the 2024 United States Grand Prix and the ninth of his career.
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It brings him to within 71 points of Antonelli’s lead in the championship, while Russell’s second and Hamilton’s third close the gap even further, with Russell now only 25 points behind his teammate and Hamilton a further seven points back in third.
It also reduces Mercedes’ lead over Ferrari in the constructors’ championship to 78 points.
Leclerc said he was ecstatic with the victory, particularly after a poor run of form that had seen him fail to finish two of the last three races and go without a podium since Japan.
“It feels incredible,” he said of the win.
“Unfortunately the end was maybe not the one I would have dreamt of, but I mean to win after the last few weekends that have been particularly difficult, all the work that we put into trying to get the feeling back in the car, I felt like I had found something yesterday between the sprint race and qualifying. But I had to confirm that today.
“And today the feeling was back where it needs to be. So I’m so incredibly happy.”
He admitted it would have been a challenge to keep Antonelli behind had the Italian not struck trouble, adding he was thankful the race finished behind the Safety Car.
“With Kimi it would have been close,” he said.
“He was very fast when he was coming towards me. So it would have been very difficult to keep that first place.
“Then I heard he had a problem. So I was like, okay, now I have quite a big gap and it should be straightforward.
“But then the Safety Car at the end. And for whatever reason, I think some backmarkers had to pass us, so I did all the Safety Car time at like 100-120 kph. My tyres were completely cold. So I was very skeptical about the restart.
“But it’s not great for the fans that are here around the track. But in the helmet I was kind of happy that there was not a restart to keep that win.
“So yeah, it feels really good.”
He added that it had been a mental challenge to overcome his poor run of form, and hoped the victory could help maintain a good feeling moving forward.
“After Monaco the feeling wasn’t there. I crashed in Q3. Then in the race we had an issue and that ended our race,” he said.
“Then Saturday in Barcelona, the feeling was good, but then I crashed again. So that was very difficult mentally. And then on Sunday we had an issue with the car.
“And Austria wasn’t so great, but here we managed to put everything together. And I really hope I can keep that momentum going forward.”
Russell, meanwhile, said he was happy to secure his first podium in front of his home fans, particularly given a late puncture had seemingly dropped him out of podium contention.
“Really pleased to be standing here,” he said.
“It was obviously a very unlucky race. Got the puncture, then got very lucky at the end with the Safety Car.”
He added that he was also glad to finish the race behind the Safety Car, despite it costing the fans a last-lap battle for the lead.
“It would have been great for the fans for it to have restarted,” he said.
“From my side, my tyres were stone cold, so I was kind of glad to just bring it home in second.
“Tough weekend, but overall good to be standing here.”
Russell said he was unsure why his pace had not been consistent across the weekend, but was hopeful of maintaining his momentum as he closes the gap to Antonelli.
“I don’t know, to be honest,” he said when asked about his pace fluctuation across the weekend.
“In qualifying we had some straight-line speed issues. I don’t know if it was there still in the race.
“But anyway, I’m going to keep pushing. My team are going to keep pushing.
“These Ferrari guys look really quick. So yeah, game on.”
Hamilton said he was happy to finish on the podium, his record 16th at Silverstone, despite losing out on second place due to the late Safety Car and overcoming an earlier penalty for a start infringement.
“This is a great result for our team. So congratulations to our team,” he said.
“I just didn’t have it today. I jumped the start, got a five-second penalty. But Charles had the pace on me today.
“I struggled with the balance of the car. But I gave it everything, and I’m grateful to be up here.”
He said he believed Ferrari was in a strong position to challenge Mercedes in the remaining races of the season.
“It looks like it,” he said when asked if he could continue to fight Mercedes.
“I’m not really sure what happened to Kimi. But the team’s doing a phenomenal job.
“We have some work still to do to really close the gap on pure performance. But look at these results. Two wins for the team this year. This is just fantastic.”
There was drama before the start as Fernando Alonso stopped halfway around the parade lap, though the Spaniard got his Aston Martin going again before heading straight into the pits, from where he started the race.
The remaining 21 drivers took their regular grid slots, where Ferrari made the perfect start as Leclerc snatched the lead from Antonelli, while Hamilton also leapt the pole-sitter for second.
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Antonelli then came under pressure from teammate Russell but held him off, while Piastri dropped down the order after clipping Lawson and damaging his front wing.
The Australian had initially launched well enough to get ahead of Norris, only to fall back into the clutches of Lawson’s Racing Bulls car and lightly clip the back of the Kiwi.
Piastri pitted at the end of Lap 2 for a front wing change and further checks, with a slow stop dropping him more than 40 seconds off the lead and into second-last, one spot ahead of Alex Albon.
Albon had his own opening-lap clash with Oliver Bearman, clipping the back of the Haas and sending it into a spin before pitting for repairs and later being handed a 10-second penalty.
Back at the front, Leclerc led Hamilton by 0.6s at the end of Lap 1, with Antonelli closing back in as he tried to recover the places lost at the start.
Verstappen moved up to fifth after overtaking teammate Hadjar, while Norris closed in on the battling Red Bull pair.
After surviving the contact with Piastri, Lawson climbed to eighth after leapfrogging teammate Lindblad, who sat ninth ahead of the fast-starting Carlos Sainz in 10th at the end of Lap 4.
The field then settled into a rhythm, with Leclerc 2.2s clear of Hamilton at the end of Lap 9 when the seven-time world champion was handed a five-second penalty for moving before the start.
Hamilton then began to complain of tyre wear as Antonelli closed to within half a second entering Lap 10, and a lap later the Mercedes driver made his way past at Copse before setting about chasing down Leclerc’s 4.2s lead.
On Lap 17, Verstappen moved up to fourth with a pass around the outside of Russell at Copse, although the Briton tried to fight back later in the lap and forced the Red Bull driver into a hard defensive move.
Verstappen then immediately dived into the pits as the first of the front-runners to stop, fitting brand-new hard tyres and rejoining seventh ahead of Lawson.
Leclerc still led by 4.2s at the end of Lap 20, with Hamilton a further 4.4s back, although the Ferrari driver still had a 4.1s buffer over Russell as he tried to limit the damage from his penalty.
Hadjar stopped on the same lap, but a slow service dropped him behind both Racing Bulls and down to 10th as Norris pushed in free air in a bid to overcut the Red Bull.
The race was slowed on Lap 22 for a Virtual Safety Car after an umbrella made its way onto the circuit, with the interruption brief as a marshal quickly removed it before green flag racing resumed on the same lap.
Russell and Hamilton pitted a lap later, with the Mercedes driver jumping the Ferrari after Hamilton failed to build enough of a gap before serving his penalty.
Leclerc then stopped at the end of Lap 25, with his lead over Antonelli down to 2.4s after the Mercedes driver had begun to close in.
Antonelli then led the race for the first time and showed strong pace, though he cut a frustrated figure over the radio as he pleaded with Mercedes not to leave him exposed to an undercut while trying to maintain a pit-stop gap to Leclerc.
Hamilton began to find pace on his new hard tyres, reeling in Russell with a series of fastest laps as both drivers also edged closer to Verstappen.
Norris pitted from third at the end of Lap 29 but emerged behind Hadjar in seventh, with his attempted overcut failing to pay off.
Hamilton passed Russell at Copse on Lap 30, only for the Briton to fight back along the Hangar Straight as the pair continued to shadow Verstappen, while Norris cleared Hadjar on the same lap to move into sixth.
Hamilton and Russell continued their fight on Lap 31, with Hamilton going around the outside at Brooklands before Russell reclaimed the place at Copse, their scrap allowing Verstappen to hold third.
Back up front, Antonelli continued to fume at Mercedes for not pitting him, worried about dropping into the clutches of the Verstappen, Russell and Hamilton battle.
On Lap 34, Mercedes reported a slow puncture for Russell, though it did not initially appear to hurt the Briton as he latched onto Verstappen.
Russell stayed out and asked for tyre pressure updates, but was called in a lap later after another wheel-to-wheel fight with Verstappen into Stowe.
He pitted at the end of Lap 35 and emerged seventh behind Hadjar, although he moved back past the Frenchman two laps later.
Antonelli finally stopped at the end of Lap 36, emerging 7.7s behind Leclerc in second and 10 seconds clear of the Hamilton-Verstappen fight, giving him 16 laps to chase down the Ferrari.
A second VSC was needed on Lap 38 when Nico Hulkenberg pulled to the side of the track to become the first retirement of the race, with Verstappen taking the opportunity to pit for brand-new medium tyres, while Norris and Hadjar also stopped.
There was further drama for Mercedes on Lap 42 as Antonelli reported smoke and dived immediately into the pits, where Mercedes changed his front wing and tyres, dropping him to fifth behind teammate Russell and promoting Hamilton to second and Verstappen to third.
The issue continued for the Italian on his out-lap as he struggled to keep the car on track, running off several times and reporting suspension problems while dropping behind both Norris and Hadjar to seventh.
Mercedes then confirmed a left wheel shield failure, with the championship leader pitting again on Lap 44 to remove the damaged shield.
He returned to the track remarkably still in the points in 10th, but was eventually handed a five-second penalty for exceeding track limits as he continued to fight the car, dropping him back out of the points.
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Verstappen was the next to hit trouble on Lap 48, with the Red Bull driver losing control and beaching himself in the gravel at Stowe to bring out the Safety Car, while Albon also retired on the same lap.
That triggered a flurry of pit stops among the front-runners, with race leader Leclerc and second-placed Hamilton both coming in, while Russell stayed out to leapfrog Hamilton into second.
The Safety Car looked set to peel in at the end of Lap 51 and set up one final lap of green-flag racing, only to remain out to the chequered flag as Leclerc crossed the line to win ahead of Russell and Hamilton.
Results: Formula 1 British Grand Prix
| Pos. | No. | Driver | Team | Laps | Time / Retired | Pts. |
| 1 | 16 | Charles Leclerc | Ferrari | 52 | 1:27:11.335 | 25 |
| 2 | 63 | George Russell | Mercedes | 52 | +0.427s | 18 |
| 3 | 44 | Lewis Hamilton | Ferrari | 52 | +0.772s | 15 |
| 4 | 1 | Lando Norris | McLaren | 52 | +1.149s | 12 |
| 5 | 6 | Isack Hadjar | Red Bull Racing | 52 | +1.598s | 10 |
| 6 | 30 | Liam Lawson | Racing Bulls | 52 | +2.023s | 8 |
| 7 | 41 | Arvid Lindblad | Racing Bulls | 52 | +2.214s | 6 |
| 8 | 5 | Gabriel Bortoleto | Audi | 52 | +2.413s | 4 |
| 9 | 43 | Franco Colapinto | Alpine | 52 | +3.229s | 2 |
| 10 | 10 | Pierre Gasly | Alpine | 52 | +3.445s | 1 |
| 11 | 81 | Oscar Piastri | McLaren | 52 | +4.014s | 0 |
| 12 | 55 | Carlos Sainz | Williams | 52 | +4.391s | 0 |
| 13 | 87 | Oliver Bearman | Haas F1 Team | 52 | +5.245s | 0 |
| 14 | 31 | Esteban Ocon | Haas F1 Team | 52 | +5.512s | 0 |
| 15 | 11 | Sergio Perez | Cadillac | 52 | +7.403s | 0 |
| 16 | 12 | Kimi Antonelli | Mercedes | 52 | +8.005s | 0 |
| 17 | 77 | Valtteri Bottas | Cadillac | 52 | +8.162s | 0 |
| 18 | 14 | Fernando Alonso | Aston Martin | 51 | +1 lap | 0 |
| 19 | 18 | Lance Stroll | Aston Martin | 51 | +1 lap | 0 |
| 20 | 3 | Max Verstappen | Red Bull Racing | 46 | DNF | 0 |
| NC | 23 | Alexander Albon | Williams | 43 | DNF | 0 |
| NC | 27 | Nico Hulkenberg | Audi | 36 | DNF | 0 |
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