| 2025 Dakar Rally | |||
|---|---|---|---|
Part of the Dakar Rally
| |||
| Host country | Saudi Arabia | ||
| Dates run | 3–17 January 2026 | ||
| Start | Yanbu | ||
| Finish | Yanbu | ||
| Stages | 14 | ||
| Stage surface | Sand, rocks, gravel, tarmac | ||
The 2026 Dakar Rally will be a rally raid event that will take place in Saudi Arabia. It is the 48th edition of the Dakar Rally, organized by Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO), and the 7th time Saudi Arabia has hosted the event. The event will take place from 3 to 17 January 2026. [1]
The presentation and race outline will take place on 13th November 2025 in Paris, France.
This year, the route will start and finish in Yanbu passing through Ha'il's desert stages, Al-Qassim, and to Riyadh for the rest day. Notably skipping the Empty Quarter, the rally will head west to new regions previously unexplored by the event to Al-Bahah, Aseer, and Jizan.
The race will consist of 14 days of racing, divided into the prologue and 13 stages. There will be four loop stages and four split route stages in two back-to-back pairs, with the cars and trucks taking a separate route to the bikes.
Competitors face a hybrid 48h Chrono/marathon on stage four, with a bare-bones bivouac where mutual assistance is permitted without time limits and class T5.2 trucks reach the bivouac to assist competitors. Stage nine to 10 will be a more traditional marathon still with a minimal bivouac. [2]
Alternative zero-emission or hybrid drives are represented again by the Mission 1000 category now in its third year. [3]
| Stage | Date | Start | Finish | Special (km) | Total (km) | Assistance (km) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FIM | FIA | FIM | FIA | ||||||
| Prologue | Saturday | 3 January 2026 | Yanbu | Yanbu | 23 | 98 | - | ||
| 1 | Sunday | 4 January 2026 | Yanbu | Yanbu | 305 | 518 | 367 | ||
| 2 | Monday | 5 January 2026 | Yanbu | Al-Ula | 400 | 504 | - | ||
| 3 | Tuesday | 6 January 2026 | Al-Ula | Al-Ula | 422 | 666 | - | ||
| 4 (Marathon) | Wednesday | 7 January 2026 | Al-Ula | Bivouac Refuge | 417 | 451 | 492 | 526 | - |
| 5 (Marathon) | Thursday | 8 January 2026 | Bivouac Refuge | Ha'il | 356 | 372 | 417 | 428 | 448 |
| 6 | Friday | 9 January 2026 | Ha'il | Riyadh | 331 | 920 | - | ||
| Rest Day | Saturday | 10 January 2026 | Riyadh | - | |||||
| 7 | Sunday | 11 January 2026 | Riyadh | Wadi ad-Dawasir | 462 | 876 | 623 | ||
| 8 | Monday | 12 January 2026 | Wadi ad-Dawasir | Wadi ad-Dawasir | 481 | 717 | - | ||
| 9 | Tuesday | 13 January 2026 | Wadi ad-Dawasir | Bivouac Refuge | 418 | 410 | 540 | 531 | - |
| 10 | Wednesday | 14 January 2026 | Bivouac Refuge | Bisha | 371 | 421 | 417 | 469 | 358 |
| 11 | Thursday | 15 January 2026 | Bisha | Al Henakiyah | 347 | 882 | 777 | ||
| 12 | Friday | 16 January 2026 | Al Henakiyah | Yanbu | 310 | 718 | 362 | ||
| 13 | Saturday | 17 January 2026 | Yanbu | Yanbu | 105 | 141 | - | ||
| Total | 4,748 | 4,840 | 7,906 | 7,994 | 3,562 | ||||