1981 World Sportscar Championship season

The 1981 World Endurance Championship for Drivers and Makes season was the 29th FIA World Sportscar Championship. The season ran from January 31, 1981 to September 27, 1981 and was composed of 15 races including races run with the Camel GT Championship as well as the Spa 24 Hours. This was the first year in which the World Challenge for Endurance Drivers was combined with the World Championship of Makes to form two championships.

Schedule
All fifteen rounds of the season were counted towards the Drivers Championship. Only six of the fifteen rounds counted towards the Championship for Makes, and are marked as Both below. The rest counted solely for the Drivers.

Season results
Although a multitude of classes contended for the Championship of Drivers and Makes, only the overall race winners are listed here.

Championship for Drivers
The drivers championship was open to various categories of cars recognized by the FIA as well as by IMSA. This included all sports prototype classes, all grand tourer classes, and all touring car classes.

American Bob Garretson won the inaugural World Endurance Championship for Drivers title.

Championship for Makes
Unlike the Championship for Drivers, the Championship for Makes was only open to select classes which participated in the six designated rounds. This included the FIA's Group 5 Special Production Cars, Group 4 Grand Touring Cars, Group 3 Series Production Grand Touring Cars, Group 2 Touring Cars, and Group 1 Series Production Touring Cars. Also included was IMSA's GTX class of cars. Two championships were awarded, for cars over 2000 cc and for those under 2000 cc.

Points were awarded for the top ten finishers in each division in the order of 20-15-12-10-8-6-4-3-2-1, with only the best five results out of the six races being totaled. Only the best placed entry of each make in each division was eligible to score points, with any other points earned by that manufacturer skipped.

Half points were awarded at Round 7 due to the race being stopped before the half distance.

Under 2000 cc
Lancia and Porsche scored an equal number of total points in their respective championships, as well as an equal number of wins in their category. However, having had a higher total of points over the six rounds, Lancia was awarded the overall Championship of Makes.