The event was the ninth time the Baku City Circuit had hosted a Formula One round, the circuit having previously staged one edition of the European Grand Prix in 2016. The race weekend ran from 19 to 21 September. Pirelli supplied the C4, C5, and C6 compounds — the three softest in their range, designated hard, medium, and soft respectively.
Going into the weekend, Piastri led the Drivers' Championship with 324 points, 31 ahead of teammate Lando Norris and 94 ahead of Verstappen in third. McLaren led the Constructors' Championship with 617 points, Ferrari second on 280, and Mercedes third on 260. McLaren could potentially clinch their tenth Constructors' title at the event: securing it required outscoring Ferrari by nine points while Mercedes and Red Bull failed to overhaul them by 12 and 33 points respectively. A McLaren 1–2 or 1–3 finish would confirm the title regardless of all other results.
Qualifying produced a record six red flags during the single session, breaking the previous mark of five set jointly at the 2022 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix and 2024 São Paulo Grand Prix. The interruptions stretched the scheduled one-hour session to over two hours. The first segment saw Liam Lawson top the times before crashes by Alexander Albon (steering rack failure) and Nico Hülkenberg (front wing and floor damage) caused two stoppages, with a third red flag following Pierre Gasly's excursion at Turn 4 and Franco Colapinto hitting the wall immediately afterwards. Esteban Ocon qualified but was disqualified for a rear-wing infringement on his Haas, starting from last. In the second segment, Oliver Bearman's Haas hit the wall at Turn 2, triggering a fourth stoppage and eliminating Fernando Alonso, Lewis Hamilton, Gabriel Bortoleto, Lance Stroll, and Bearman. The final segment brought two further crashes: Charles Leclerc found the wall at Turn 15 without having set a time and started tenth, ending his run of Baku pole positions stretching back to 2019; Piastri then hit Turn 3, also without a time, and started ninth. Verstappen took pole ahead of Carlos Sainz Jr. and Lawson. Kimi Antonelli qualified fourth — his best grid position since the Canadian Grand Prix and the first time he had outqualified teammate George Russell since Miami. Sainz recorded Williams' first front-row start since the 2021 Belgian Grand Prix.
The 51-lap race started at 15:00 local time. Piastri's troubled weekend culminated immediately: he jumped the start, activated the anti-stall system, fell to last, and then crashed out at Turn 6 on lap 1 — his first retirement since the 2023 United States Grand Prix — bringing out the safety car, which was withdrawn on lap 4. Fernando Alonso, behind Piastri, reacted incorrectly to Piastri's jumped start and was penalised for doing so himself. Russell, who was feeling unwell throughout the weekend, started on hard tyres and suffered a poor safety-car restart, losing positions to Yuki Tsunoda and Antonelli before recovering past Tsunoda. On lap 17, Albon attempted to pass Colapinto at Turn 7, striking his rear-left and sending Colapinto into a spin; a brief safety car was deployed and Albon received a ten-second penalty.
Verstappen led from lights to flag, taking his fourth victory of the season and his first consecutive wins of the year. Russell was elevated to second by lap 40 after overcut Sainz with a well-timed pit stop, and his seventh podium of the season. Sainz's third place was Williams' first podium since the rain-curtailed 2021 Belgian Grand Prix and their first from a full race distance since the 2017 Azerbaijan Grand Prix. Antonelli finished fourth, while Lawson took fifth — his best career result — with his Racing Bulls teammate Isack Hadjar claiming tenth to extend the team's points-scoring streak to five consecutive races. Norris finished seventh and Hamilton eighth.
Following the race, Norris reduced the gap to Piastri in the Drivers' Championship to 25 points, with Verstappen a further 44 adrift in third. In the Constructors' standings, McLaren extended their lead to 333 points; Mercedes moved into second on 290, four ahead of Ferrari, who dropped to third. Red Bull remained fourth, 18 points behind Mercedes.