Pirelli is bringing three tyre compounds to Bahrain:

P Zero White medium – less grip, less wear (used for long-race stints)
P Zero Yellow soft – more grip, medium wear (used for shorter-race stints and for the initial portion of qualifying)
P Zero Red supersoft – highest amount of grip, highest amount of wear (used for qualifying and select race situations).

Two of the three available compounds must be used during the race. Teams are able to decide when they want to run which compound, adding an element of strategy to the race. (If the race takes place in the wet, the Cinturato Blue full wet tyre and the Cinturato green intermediate tyre will be made available.)

A driver can use all three sets of Pirelli tyres in a race. For example, if they used the P Zero Red supersoft to advance from Q2 to Q3, they would start the race on those tyres and attempt to make some lightning-quick laps to gain a margin over their counterparts before pitting for the P Zero White medium. Then depending on circumstances that unfold during the race, another pit stop could be made for the P Zero Yellow soft, allowing the driver to better attack during the race’s closing laps.

Pirelli provides each driver with 13 sets of dry tyres for the race weekend. Of these 13 sets, drivers and their teams can choose the specifications of 10 of those sets from the three compounds Pirelli selected. The remaining three sets are defined by Pirelli – two mandatory tyre specifications for the race (one set of P Zero Yellow softs and one set of P Zero White mediums), and one mandatory specification for Q3 (one set of P Zero Red supersofts).