World Rally Championship: Rally Scotland to take place in autumn as 2027 calendar released

The inaugural Rally Scotland will take place from 30 September-3 October in an extended 2027 World Rally Championship (WRC) calendar released by the FIA and the sport's promoters.

The gravel event in Aberdeenshire will form the 12th round of a 15-event calendar, as it joins the USA as new events on the schedule.

It is the first time the United Kingdom has hosted a round of the WRC since 2019, and BBC Sport will provide extensive live coverage of the rally.

It will also be a home round for new World Rally champion Elfyn Evans, who won the title in dramatic circumstances in Sardinia on Sunday after rival Oliver Solberg crashed at the end of the final stage.

In doing so, Evans became the first WRC champion from the UK in 25 years and joined the late Colin McRae and Richard Burns as the sport's top-level title winners.

Northern Ireland drivers Josh McErlean and Jon Armstrong also competed at the top level of the sport in 2026 and will be aiming to return next year.

In addition to Rally Scotland, the BBC's coverage will include five live stages plus the Power Stage on all WRC rounds, highlights programmes, plus digital clips and content across BBC platforms.

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The season will start on the icy tarmac roads in Monte Carlo from 21-24 January before rounds in the snow in Sweden and vast landscapes of Safari Rally Kenya.

Three tarmac events in a row then take place in Croatia, the Canary Islands and Japan, before the Acropolis Rally in Greece.

The WRC's Italian round moves from September to July, and will switch from the gravel roads of Sardinia to tarmac in Rome.

The high-speed events in Estonia and Finland retain their back-to-back summer slots before the USA hosts its first WRC round in 39 years from 26-29 August.

The WRC last held a points-paying round in the USA at the Olympus Rally in 1988, and the championship will return as a gravel round after a successful candidate event in June.

Rally Scotland takes place in early October before a South American double-header, in Paraguay and Chile, and Rally Saudi Arabia round out the calendar.

A Saudi Arabia race was set to end the 2026 season but it was cancelled because of the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.

Rally de Portugal will not feature in the 2027 calendar but is in talks to return in 2028.

The upcoming season will mark a new era for the sport with the introduction of a new promoter along with WRC27 regulations which will limit costs and reduce the horsepower of the top cars.

It will also mark the return of Ford as a manufacturer to the sport in a collaboration with the M-Sport banner.