Formula E has a big 12 months coming up with more powerful cars - something we've already had a taste of - the return of pitstops and a likely closer-than-ever title battle to enjoy.
But with that come some burning questions on what the championship can achieve as it enters its second decade in one of sport's most crowded live arenas.
The Race has, ad nauseam, covered off the need for Formula E to be seen and embraced by more people through improved broadcasting deals and streaming platforms. We're going to leave that particular topic for the time being and instead focus on five other key questions that Formula E has to answer - or at least start to answer - in 2025.
Will the EV market's volatility impact Formula E?
Where is Formula E going? And does it really know itself?
These are questions that have long since hung in the balance in terms of getting adequate answers - which might not even come for several years.
That's because the growth of the wider market and take up of electric vehicles is generally quite volatile. Yes, the sales figures are going up every year, but not nearly close enough to the initial projections made by manufacturers and the car industry at large.
There are lots of strong sales in key markets, with EVs now having a 23% market share of new car sales in the UK. This will likely improve over the coming years too.
But there is the discrepancy in costs of manufacturing from the prolific Chinese EV industry success, where a dynamic price to performance ratio and a fertile cell technology platform offers better value for money, versus the Western manufacturers which are set up for higher priced (and therefore less attractive) EV products.
One of the reasons for this disappointing pace of sales is the lack of industrial and infrastructure investment by Western brands compared to Chinese manufacturers according to a recent Business Insider report.
In the same publication, former automotive executive Andy Palmer, often described as the godfather of the electric car for pushing the mass-market Nissan Leaf project through so rigorously over a decade ago, said that EVs must "win out" over hybrids.
Palmer added that delaying transitioning to EVs in favour of hybrids was a "fool's errand" and advised that manufacturers doing so risked falling behind their Chinese EV equivalents, including BYD.
"Hybrids are a road to hell and they are a transition strategy, and the longer you stay on that transition, the less quickly you ramp up into the new world," said Palmer.
"If you just delay transitioning to EVs by diluting it with hybrids then you are more uncompetitive for longer, and you allow the Chinese to continue to develop their market and their leadership. I honestly think it’s a fool's errand."
So how does all this affect Formula E?
It's involved because it works to a future-focused model in its rulesets, which work to four-year cycles. The Gen4 rules are the key focus currently (more on that below) and that means manufacturers have to swallow non-recoverable engineering costs to some degree ahead of competing with the part-spec, part-manufacturer-derived package.
Nissan, Porsche, Jaguar, Lola and Maserati (Stellantis) have already given the thumbs up which, on paper, secures Formula E until 2030, which co-incidentally is when many governments are planning to ban (or at least discourage) the sale of new fossil-fuel-powered vehicles.
Last month, the UK's department for transport issued its consultation paper detailing how it planned to phase out internal combustion engine vehicles in favour of EVs as part of its zero emissions target for 2035.
"The last government did great harm to the UK's reputation as a leading nation in the EV transition by moving goalposts on phase-out dates and creating doubt in the minds of investors and boardrooms," stated the foreword to the paper.
"Their actions imperilled the billions of pounds of committed investment in the automotive sector and in key areas such as the UK's burgeoning charge point sector. We will not repeat this mistake. All new cars and vans will need to be 100% zero emission by 2035. And no new petrol or diesel cars will be sold after 2030."
Look beyond the party politics and it does seem that the present Labour government is much more serious about achieving zero-emission vehicle mandates.
Ultimately these promises, and prime minister Sir Keir Starmer's insistence at the COP29 climate summit in Baku last year that the UK will become zero-emission in a range of industries into the next decade, should be of benefit to Formula E.
That's because manufacturers, associated partners and the promoters will have a tailwind to accelerate Formula E into being a much more powerful sporting force, building on its established Global Sustainability Benchmark in Sport (GSBS) which it achieved for the third consecutive year in 2024, maintaining its leadership of the Corporate, Environment, Social and Governance (CESG) ranking.
Can harmful calendar chasms be avoided?
"I think that we will always be susceptible to calendar change and uncertainty as long as we race on temporary tracks; there are simply too many variables and obstacles to be overcome," Andretti's commercial chief Jim Wright opined to The Race.
"The tipping point will be when the venues are really committed to paying high rights fees [as in Formula 1] which has far more certainty over its temporary circuits because they are so heavily invested in the event."
There are a variety of circuit models that Formula E has, including the upcoming permanent (albeit truncated) Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez. This is by far its most successful in terms of a crowd with around 45,000-50,000 attending the event and all but filling the famed Foro Sol terracing.
Jeddah will be another proven venue as Formula E races on a smaller version of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix circuit, while familiar tracks at Monaco, Jakarta, London and Berlin are raced on in addition to permanent facilities at Homestead and Shanghai and one of only two pop-up tracks in the Ariake district for the second and third Tokyo E-Prixs in May.
It's a decent calendar, even if it lacks both the pizzazz of Rome, Hong Kong and Paris, and the pure sporting challenges of Diriyah and Rome.
Formula E has had to adapt for several reasons and reign in the costs a fair bit. But that has also opened it up to big gaps in its schedule. It is expected to have to fill the two-month hole from Jeddah in February to Homestead in April with a marketing and media event in Miami for early March.
To some extent the Formula E calendar has always been the problem child and 2025 will still be prone to some cantankerous behaviour, in the shape of the eight-week hole.
But in reality this isn't being seen as anything approaching a crisis by the promoter. Quite the opposite, as it is quietly briefing stakeholders that more top-class events, including perhaps two old favourites, possibly one of them Hong Kong, could be back in 2026 and for the Gen4 era a calendar of 20-plus races might be attainable.
Will it ever make money?
Formula E has consistently lost money since its inception in 2014. Getting a grip on the finances while growing the media exposure of the all-electric world championship is a big remit of CEO Jeff Dodds.
Liberty's ownership of Formula E, which was confirmed last June, will likely only amplify this and recent-ish key staff acquisitions and changes highlight a notion that saving money has been a watch word in the last 18 months since Dodds took over from CEO predecessor Jamie Reigle.
Tiziana di Gioia was hired from Juventus Football Club early in 2024, while chief finance officer Mike Papadimitriou will be replaced by former director of corporate finance and latterly vice president of investor relations Max Adkins next week.
Formula E cut several of its staff in July after the end of its 10th season and continues to make changes in many aspects of how it operates, notably improving its efficiency and sustainability credentials by condensing the freight it takes to races for the 2024-25 season and beyond.
Last year, Formula E revealed a loss of €42.4million (£35.2m) for the financial year ending in September 2023. This was compared to the previous year's €65m (£54m) loss.
As of 2023, Formula E had a total loss of €280m (£232m). The aim of Formula E now is to improve on the €22.6m (£18.8m) pull back from 2023 compared to 2022 with added revenue and lower costs.
Formula E lost big name partners like Hugo Boss, Tag Heuer and Moët & Chandon in recent years but has since secured deals with the likes of Hackett men's clothing and the Taittinger champagne house.
Improving sponsorship income and increasing amounts of revenue and media income as they grow is hugely important for Formula E right now. The challenge is that it's competing in a similar space to F1 where the payback and prestige is much higher.
But the good news is that Dodds and co appear now to be getting a tighter grip on spending, which had previously been erratic, especially in some of its infamously bloated marketing films.
Will Gen4 avoid the problems of Gen3 build-up?
The Gen4 project, Formula E's most ambitious yet, is well underway with the first mule car getting ready to test in the coming months.
Tyre compounds have already been tried by Bridgestone, the supplier from the 2026-27 season. James Rossiter conducted some of that testing recently and several days have been completed ahead of further work in the first half of 2025.
The project appears to be on schedule and some are even saying ahead of schedule. Ex-Renault and Nissan technical director Vincent Gaillardot is a major figure in the Gen4 project and this is significant, not only for his vast experience but also because he was someone who went through the pain of the Gen3 project in 2022 and 2023 when an undercooked Formula E car was rolled out for the first race of the era in Mexico in January 2023.
A host of issues were eventually ironed out but it was a laborious process that sometimes bordered on meltdown.
That clearly cannot happen again and the likes of Gaillardot and fellow former Formula E technical wizard Thomas Chevaucher, formerly of DS Performance and Stellantis, have been strategic choices to bolster the FIA's technical department when it comes to management and getting a more cohesive element to a major project such as Gen4.
While there are zero concerns surrounding the tyres via Bridgestone, or the Marelli company that will provide the front MGU, there is little known about the all-important battery supplier, Podium Advanced Technologies (PAT).
That's not to say the company is not capable because clearly the FIA would not have chosen it as a tender winner, yet PAT's experience in large-volume battery design, manufacturing and support engineering is slim.
PAT has a strong track record on projects such as the Glickenhaus LMP car and a technical collaboration with Ducati with which it supplies all batteries for the MotoE series. It is also expanding, as it developed a 16,000-square-meter facility known as the Podium Campus for innovation in manufacturing and engineering.
But the intricacies, aggressive timeframes and acute attention to detail for the spec-battery systems for Formula E has tested well-established companies such as Williams Advanced Engineering, McLaren Applied and now the Fortescue Zero organisation massively over the last 10 years.
The technical ask of the Gen4 batteries will be extreme and still, despite the advancement in motors, inverters and the gearboxes of Formula E cars, it is the RESSs (batteries) that are the lynchpin in all forms for Formula E as it heads into its fourth era in 2026.
What about the undercard?
Formula E's history of support series or initiatives flits from experimental (Roborace), promising but fleeting (Jaguar I-Pace eTROPHY) and the non-starter (NXT Gen Cup).
Several possibilities exist, including Dilbagh Gill's FG Series and a possible but unlikely rebirth for the NXT Gen Cup. Yet perhaps the more ambitious option is something to promote female talent.
An acorn was planted with the first ever all-female test session, involving all teams, at the Jarama pre-season test in early November.
It was a success in the sense that it generated headlines and also drew together a quality field. In the context of the test being moved from Valencia to Jarama at the last minute and the first experience of the quirky steering and feel that the Gen3 Evo gave with all-wheel drive, some of those who took part showed well.
With the jury still out on the quality of the F1 Academy set-up and only the Iron Dames scheme seeming to have genuine credibility on the international scene, a support category - using the soon-to-be obsolete Gen3 Evo machines - seems like a no-brainer.
But there is still somehow commercial sensitivity in getting female motorsport properly promoted and perhaps the messy and costly demise of the W Series, of which Formula E picked up the copyrights from, is part of the scepticism.
But Formula E under Dodds's tenure is genuinely prioritising female talent and has recently embraced an enhancement to the FIA Girls on Track programme. Additions there will include new race-day activations for 50 young women and more behind-the-scenes access available to those looking to build careers in motorsport and science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
Dodds told The Race in November: "If we were going to introduce a feeder series of some description, the logical time to do that would be at the point we launch Gen4, because then we'd have these incredible Gen3 Evo cars as well, which I think is a real pathway from Gen3 Evo into Gen4.
"You could bring people through, as opposed to putting them in a car that bears no resemblance in performance terms to what they would then need to go into for a Gen4 car. So, I think that would be the logical time to do it."
But a lot must happen before that becomes a reality and it would have to gain some serious traction in the first half of 2025 in order for it to be made anything close to feasible for a late 2026 start.
