At Last, We Know When the Corvette ZR1 Will Debut! (It’s July 25)

Chevrolet wants you to mark this on your calendar: July 25, 2024. That’s the day we finally get a look at the 2025 Corvette ZR1.

Or, as Chevy puts it: “We’re gearing up to reveal the unthinkable.”

Unthinkable? Chevrolet has been squeezing out ZR1 teasers in little drips and drabs for months—how can we not think of the car?

Just last April, Chevy shared: “The unthinkable is on the horizon: Corvette ZR1 is coming this summer.” Attached was a link to a 21-second YouTube video that shows a lot of computer-generated smoke masking what looks like a computer-generated Corvette speeding away. Presumably, though, the soundtrack was real, and the audio of what a ZR1 will sound like under power is indeed impressive.

The video linked today is even shorter—4.7 seconds of smoke, and the sound of a car accelerating away from the microphone.

Of course, rumor and information, some it of dubious credibility, is swirling about how the 2025 ZR1 will be powered. Based on the audio, we think the foundation will be the Z06’s muscular 5.5-liter V-8, which in that normally-aspirated configuration makes 670 horsepower. Add a couple of turbochargers, and the ZR1 could easily make over 800 horses; we think 850 is a nice number.

Of course, that could go higher still if the ZR1 is fitted with the Corvette E-Ray’s front axle-mounted, 160-horsepower electric motor. We think 950 is a nice number, too, and all-wheel-drive would be icing on the cake. Or are they saving the electrical bits for the long-rumored, 1000-horsepower Zora Corvette?

These are heady numbers, but unlike, say, the late, lamented 797-horse Dodge Challenger Hellcat Redeye, which was wonderful in a straight line but a handful on any racetrack with turns, the ZR1 will be a monster on a road course. Look at what Chevrolet was able to do with the 2019 ZR1, built on the front-engine C7 platform: It had a 755-horsepower, supercharged V-8 that made it fun on the drag strip, but where it really excelled was through the corners.

That’s the mandate for the 2025 Corvette ZR1, too. It will benefit from the C8’s mid-engine design, pretty much the optimum layout for exceptional handling. The car will have massive downforce; judging from spy shots of the ZR1, it’ll get a free-standing rear wing that’s bigger than that on the Z06, and an aggressive nose and splitter design inspired by the aerodynamics of the Corvette C8.R race car, which competes in the IMSA series. Some kind of active aero is not only possible, it’s probable.

Expect massive rubber at all four corners—Michelins, probably— circling similarly enormous carbon ceramic brakes, which came standard on the 2019 ZR1. Expect a massive base price, too, maybe as high as $165,000. After all, the base price of a 2019 ZR1 was $125K—that’s 155 grand in today’s dollars.

And expect more rumors to fly now that we know the 2025 Corvette ZR1 reveal date; we’ll pass along the good ones, and we’ll take you to the car’s debut. Don’t forget to mark those calendars.

***

Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.