18 Porsche of Marc Lieb, Romain Dumas and Neel Jani qualified in pole position by recording the fastest lap in qualifying and maintained the lead until it was issued with multiple penalties relating to excessive fuel consumption at its first pit stop and the consequence of this allowed the sister Porsche of Timo Bernhard, Brendon Hartley and Mark Webber to move to the front of the field.

The car kept the lead through the following sequence of pit stops and Webber drove the Porsche across the start/finish line at the end of the race to claim his, Bernhard and Hartley's first outright victories in the World Endurance Championship.

92 Porsche 911 RSR took the victory in the Le Mans Grand Tourer Endurance Professional (LMGTE Pro) class with the sister car driven by Patrick Pilet and Frédéric Makowiecki taking second despite the duo serving two penalties during the course of the race.

72 SMP Racing Ferrari of Viktor Shaytar, Aleskey Bakov and Andrea Bertolini who held it to clinch the class victory, ahead of the No.

Porsche increased its lead in the Manufacturers' Championship on 184 points, thirty-three ahead of Audi and a further 62 in front of Toyota with four rounds left in the season.

[1] Three weeks prior, Nissan announced their decision to delay their return to the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) so they could address energy recovery system faults with their two GT-R LM Nismos and resume their testing programme in the United States.

[4] Zoël Amberg was withdrawn on medical grounds which were believed to be related from a crash he suffered at the Monaco GP2 Series round three months prior.

[6] The Le Mans Grand Touring Endurance Professional (LMGTE Pro) field consisted of three manufacturers (Aston Martin, Ferrari and Porsche), while the Le Mans Grand Touring Endurance Amateur (LMGTE Am) entrants were six teams: Aston Martin Racing, AF Corse, Larbre Compétition, Dempsey-Racing Proton, Porsche Team Manthley, and SMP Racing.

[10] The race was the first world sports car championship round to be held at the circuit since the 1991 430 km of Nürburgring,[11] and took place on a modified version of the sixteen-turn 5.148-kilometre (3.199 mi) layout which lacked the Veedol chicane.

The trio of Lieb, Dumas and Jani secured two consecutive second-place finishes and their teammates Bernhard, Webber and Hartley placed second at Le Mans.

[13] After Le Mans, the FIA Endurance Committee altered the balance of performance in the GTE categories, reducing the size of the air restrictor on the air intake of the Aston Martin Vantage engines by 0.5 millimetres (0.020 in) and lowering the weight of the Porsche 911 RSRs in LMGTE Pro by 10 kilograms (22 lb) and 15 kilograms (33 lb) was removed from the LMGTE Am version of the car.

[24] Dumas made contact with the left-rear section of François Perrodo's car at turn two which led to a punctured tyre; both drivers were forced to the pit lane for repairs.

[25] Lieb and Bernhard immediately put the two Porsches with their lap times in the low one minute and 36 second range and the Audis of Oliver Jarvis and Fässler followed in the next two positions.

71 Ferrari, were the fastest LMGTE Pro drivers with a two-lap average time of 1 minute and 54.275 seconds, and took AF Corse first pole position since the 2014 6 Hours of Circuit of the Americas.

[30] The Russian duo of Victor Shaytar and Alexei Basov took the pole position in LMGTE Am, half a second faster than the second-placed qualifier, the No.

13 Rebellion R-One of Alexandre Imperatori was forced to enter the pit lane for an engine problem which necessitated repairs by team mechanics.

[37] Upfront, Jani opened up his advantage to three seconds by the start of the third lap,[35] while Frédéric Makowiecki moved in front of Sørensen for third in LMGTE Pro.

Makowiecki was later adjudged by the stewards to have jumped the start and they handed him a drive-through penalty after eight minutes,[35] promoting his teammate Michael Christensen into third in class.

[37] Bruni slowed with an electrical fault and then stopped on track at the Dunlop hairpin which led to the activation of the full course yellow procedure and his teammate Calado took over the lead of LMGTE Pro.

[35] After a few laps, Duval and Fässler drew close to Bernhard,[35] while Kane moved past Oliver Webb for fifth in LMP2 and began putting pressure on Panciatici for fourth in class.

12 Rebellion R-One due to debris becoming lodged in the master switch which shut down the car and activated the fire extinguisher on the start/finish straight.

[35][38] Patrick Dempsey lost third to Perrordo in LMGTE Am and Dalla Lana and Khaled-Al Qubaisi ran closely behind each other until the latter fell back due to possibly being cautioned about track limits.

Once racing resumed, Dumas was catching Hartley but was twice penalised with a half a minute stop-and-go penalty and a one-minute infringement that he was mandated to serve on consecutive laps.

Ried then lost fourth to Kristan Poulsen when the two Audis lapped them and Al-Quabisi spun at turn ten after sustaining heavy frontal damage.

[38] Just as the full course yellow was necessitated,[35] Makowiecki and Calado made contact leaving the Dunlop hairpin which led to the Ferrari's rear bodywork rubbing against its left-rear tyre.

[38] As the race entered the final three hours, Yacaman moved in front of teammate Rusinov for second in LMP2,[39] and Rigon was forced into the pit lane for a replacement tyre after his left-rear was punctured from the bodywork rubbing against it.

Another round of pit stops followed after three hours and twenty-eight minutes which had several changes of driver and three of the four class leaders keeping their positions except for Long who had one of his doors replaced because of a window fault design.

Capillaire spun after going too fast heading into the Veedol chicane and the full course yellow was shown for the fourth time so marshals could clean the track.

A slow pit stop by di Grassi dropped him to fourth while Lieb lapped quickly and moved in front of Lotterer for second.

[42] The first three positions in LMGTE Pro were unchanged in the final hour and Lietz led home teammate Pilet for a Porsche one-two finish with the podium completed by Rigon's No.