Esteban Ocon calls himself a free agent, and three points explain why

Esteban Ocon does not know where he will race in 2027. “At the moment I’m definitely a free agent for next year,” the Haas driver said at the media day in Baku on Wednesday, the clearest sign yet that his time at the American team ends after two seasons.

Update, 20 October 2026: Ocon confirmed on 30 September that he leaves Haas at the end of 2026 (our report), and on 15 October Haas named Ferrari junior Rafael Câmara as his successor for 2027 (formula1.com). Ocon has not announced a new team.

Haas has not announced its 2027 line-up. Reports from The Race and PlanetF1 on Wednesday say the team intends to go without Ocon, and both name Ferrari junior Rafael Câmara, who races in Formula 2 this year, as the favourite for the seat. The Race adds that nothing has been signed yet.

Three points against eighteen

The numbers explain why the question is being asked. Ocon has scored 3 points in fourteen races this season: one for tenth in Japan and two for ninth in Monaco, according to the official Formula 1 results. His team-mate Oliver Bearman has 18.

Since Monaco his best finish is eleventh at the Madring earlier this month. He retired at Zandvoort and finished sixteenth at Monza.

“I’ve got a lot more to give to this sport”

Ocon rejected any suggestion that he might leave Formula 1. Asked whether he was looking at other series, he told reporters in Baku, as quoted by Formula1.com: “No. Everything that we’re looking at is in F1. I’m 30 years old, raced 10 years in F1, but I’ve got a lot more to give to this sport.”

He was blunt about his own record. “Having won one race and being a couple of times on the podium doesn’t satisfy me,” he said. “I’ve raced almost 200 races, which is a lot, but I’m not happy with what I’ve done and what I’ve achieved so far.”

That single win came in Hungary in 2021, with Alpine. Ocon joined Haas for 2025 after five seasons with the Enstone team.

Other names in the frame

PlanetF1 also lists Toyota-backed drivers Ryo Hirakawa and Sho Tsunoi, and Jack Doohan, as options Haas has looked at. Haas’s partnership with Toyota explains why the first two are on the list, but none of the three has been linked as strongly as Câmara.

Bearman is expected to stay. He has outscored Ocon comfortably all year, and a pairing of Bearman and Câmara would give Haas two drivers from the Maranello academy.

How we see it

Drivers rarely call themselves free agents in public unless they already know the answer. We read Wednesday’s words as Ocon getting ahead of an announcement rather than opening a negotiation.

The harder question is where he goes. The 2027 grid is filling up, and a 30-year-old with one win and three points this season is not the market’s first call. His case rests on experience, and on the argument that this Haas has not shown what he can do. More on his career is on our Esteban Ocon driver profile, and the Azerbaijan Grand Prix weekend starts on Thursday: our Baku schedule and start times has every session.