Automobile Year (formerly asAnnual Automobile Review) is ayearbook specialising in automobile and motorsport,published annually in three different languages;English,French (asL'Année Automobile),German (asAuto-Jahr). More recent editions now carry the tagline: "The Annual For Car Enthusiasts". Most recently, from issue 63 in 2015, it is only published in French, as "L'Annee Automobile".

The book, then titledAnnual Automobile Review was launched in 1953 by Ami Guichard (1921–1986), aSwiss motoring writer and entrepreneur fromLausanne who published it through his company, Edita S.A. He brought along the best writers and photographers he knew includingCharles Faroux (the founder of the24 Hours of Le Mans),^[1]Giovanni Lurani andYves Debraine.^[2] One of the other contributor,Bernard Cahier was credited by Guichard for introducing him to the world of motorsport.^[2] Unlike the German and French editions, the English edition in 1956 underwent a name change when it becameAutomobile Year, relegating its original title to the book's subtitle and banishing it the following year.^[3]

Jean-Rodolphe Piccard, the book's deputy editor of ten years, replaced Guichard in 1986, following his sudden death, in turn, his publishing companyEditions JR took over the running of the book. In 2005 Piccard retired and Christian Philippsen, aMonégasque motoring industry consultant, took over the running of the yearbook.^[2] In 2009 ETA-I of France took over publication of the Annual, after purchasing the rights from Christian Philippsen.

Since its launch, the book is split into three different sections,Industry,Motorsport andCulture.^[4] Following an introduction by the editor, the book begins with a section about the motor industry with news and new car launches.^[5] The motorsport section follows, starting with a section onFormula One and highly significant single seater series (A1GP,Indianapolis 500,IRL andChamp Car), followed byendurance racing reviews (24 Hours of Le Mans,Le Mans Series,American Le Mans Series andFIA GT Championship), thentouring car racing and finallyrallying (World Rally Championship andDakar Rally). A section forcar culture concludes the series.^[4][5]

Prior to when Philippsen came to the helm, the book was split into two sections, a section featuring new automobile launches and culture and motorsport season reviews with results points table following that.

In the past,sportscar racing had always followed F1, then the US racing scene, rallying, F3000 and finally touring cars ends the section.

The USOpen wheel racing coverage,CART in particular, was placed within the US racing section along withNASCAR and theTrans-Am Series, nowadays, it follows the F1 coverage. Despite being astock car racing series, NASCAR is now placed within the touring car section with WTCC andDTM. Until 1989, these and theIMSA Camel GT series was the only non-FIA events the book covered. The IMSA series, until 1985, was covered within the US racing section, when followed the World Sportscar Championship coverage in their own section.

Until the series demise, the touring car section dealt only theEuropean Touring Car Championship, excepting for 1987 when it covered theWorld Touring Car Championship. After that, it covered significant European domestic series such as DTM {Deutsche Tourenwagen Meisterschaft}

Also previously featured in its own section was significantFIA European single seater series such asF3000, its precessorF2 andF3.

The book concludes with a race result section, featuring a depth by depth results of each F1 and 24 hours of Le Mans races covered with a points table of FIA series, these are now incorporated into their own section.^[5]

• John Fitch (1954)
• Paul Frère (1954)
• Denis Jenkinson (1955)
• Giovanni Lurani (1954)
• Gordon Murray
• Jacques Ickx [it]
• Günther Molter
• Federico Kirbus (1955)
• José Rosinski [fr] (editor in chief 1972–1973, 1976)

• Official site
• Official U.S. site

• 1953 establishments in France
• Annual magazines
• Formula One mass media
• Magazines published in France
• IndyCar Series mass media
• Magazines established in 1953
• NASCAR magazines
• Books about cars
• French-language magazines

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• Articles with dead external links from January 2011
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• Use mdy dates from March 2025