Buemi won the pole position by recording the fastest time in qualifying and held off second-placed starter Jean-Éric Vergne to keep the lead at the start of the race.

Buemi pulled away from Vergne but the field was closed after a crash between championship rival Lucas di Grassi and António Félix da Costa on the 16th lap brought out a full course yellow.

The result extended Buemi's Drivers' Championship advantage to 43 points ahead of di Grassi, and his teammate Nico Prost maintained third place.

e.Dams-Renault consolidated their lead in the Teams' Championship to 75 points in front of the non-scoring Audi Sport ABT, and Mahindra kept third position with six races left in the season.

The Paris ePrix was confirmed as part of Formula E's 2016–17 series schedule in September 2016 by the FIA World Motor Sport Council.

[10] Buemi, the pre-race favourite,[11] stated that after winning the Monaco ePrix one week prior, he ventured to Paris with more motivation to achieve another podium finish, saying: "It's a special weekend for us with the team and I will do my best to continue our top form.

"[12] José María López stated he felt his team were due a good finish after a sub-par performance in Monaco and had prepared extensively for the race.

Loïc Duval (Dragon) and Maro Engel (Venturi) were unable to drive in Paris because of a Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters commitment at the Lausitzring and were replaced by Toyota World Endurance Championship (WEC) driver Mike Conway and the Formula V8 3.5 Series champion Tom Dillmann.

[16] Dillmann stated in a press release that he was "delighted" to take part in the event and expressed his desire to contest a full season of the series in the future.

Vergne, Di Grassi, Felix Rosenqvist, Bird, Conway, Nelson Piquet Jr., Heidfeld and Prost made up positions three to ten.

[21][22] Esteban Gutiérrez went onto a run-off area, and both Audi Sport ABT drivers locked their tyres, reversing out of the turn one escape road.

Buemi, Daniel Abt, Bird, Rosenqvist, Prost, Oliver Turvey of NextEV, Vergne and Andretti's Robin Frijns occupied positions three through ten.

[23] During the second practice, where multiple drivers ran deep onto the turn one run-off area,[23] Conway pushed hard, causing him to lose control of his car's rear at the final corner.

[1] Lap times were slower than the previous year's session because of subtle track surface changes and new tyres provided by Michelin.

López was fastest in the track's first third of the lap to lead the second group, followed by Mitch Evans (Jaguar) and Prost, Conway and Piquet.

[25][26] Despite going the fastest of any competitor in the fourth group, Heidfeld narrowly missed out on qualifying for the super pole, while second-quickest driver Frijns was also not able to advance further by less than a tenth of a second.

Dillmann, António Félix da Costa and Adam Carroll (Andretti and Jaguar) competed the fourth group's running order.

[26] Gutiérrez was the first driver to attempt his super pole lap and recorded fast times before locking his brakes and running deep into the turn eight escape road, and was restricted to fifth.

[25][26] López, seeking his first pole position in Formula E, was the next competitor to drive onto the track and took third,[26] but was investigated for the inadvertent usage of excessive electrical energy on his out-lap after mistakenly switching his car's settings.

[28] Following penalties, the rest of the grid order was set as Heidfeld, Rosenqvist, Frijns, Evans, Prost, Conway, Piquet, d'Ambrosio, di Grassi, Turvey, Dillmann, Abt, Félix da Costa, Bird, Carroll and Sarrazin.

Di Grassi then steered right to take the turn with his car's right-rear corner level with Félix da Costa's front-left wheel, causing the two to collide.

[33] Di Grassi was able to restart but Félix da Costa's race ended prematurely and the full course yellow flag was shown to allow officials to retrieve his car.

[32] Conway made his pit stop on lap 26, handing the lead back to Buemi, whose advantage over Vergne had been reduced to slightly more than one second.

Vergne ran wide leaving turn 13, damaging his vehicle's front-right corner in a collision with a barrier and ending his race.

Frijns, Dillmann and Gutiérrez were issued five-second time penalties after they were observed speeding under full course yellow flag conditions.

[37] Abt caused confusion when his car stopped on the track halfway before the start/finish line with a battery management system failure;[37][38] drivers behind him were hesitant to pass him for fear of being penalised, creating a large blockade on the narrow backstraight.

Buemi revealed he attempted to brake as late as possible to prevent Vergne from overtaking him at the start but had used more electrical energy than expected when he established an advantage.

[39] Third-place finisher Heidfeld stated it felt "great" to have achieved his second consecutive podium result, and that it was "another exciting race", and his team were more competitive than they were in Monaco.

"[33] Di Grassi said his team would forget about the event because of him going from being the fastest driver in the second practice session to having a slow qualifying lap and would recover for the next race of the season.

"[34] Frijns said he was delighted to finish in a points-scoring position but felt the event was "one of the more bizarre races of my career" and was of the opinion that luck was on his side.