With a three-week gap between the British and German GPs, there was a lot of testing going on and some new faces appearing in the cars. Williams ran a youngster called Ayrton Senna while Brabham ran a test at Brands Hatch for Pierluigi Martini, Davy Jones, Ivan Capelli and Stirling Moss (!)

There were suggestions that Patrick Tambay would be dropped by Ferrari at the end of the year to make way for Michele Alboreto and hints that Arrows would be using BMW engines in 1984.

For all this the entry was unchanged and Tambay took pole position with René Arnoux second, making it a Ferrari 1-2. Andrea de Cesaris was third quickest in his Alfa Romeo ahead of Nelson Piquet's Brabham-BMW, Alain Prost's Renault (which was leading the championship), Eddie Cheever's Renault, Mauro Baldi's Alfa Romeo and Riccardo Patrese in the second Brabham-BMW. The top 10 was completed by the two Toleman-Harts of Derek Warwick and Bruno Giacomelli.

The race saw Tambay head off in the lead but he was soon overtaken by Arnoux and the Frenchman stayed ahead (apart from during the pit stops) for the rest of the afternoon. Tambay went out with engine trouble after 11 laps and so Piquet was second and he led after Arnoux stopped in the mid-race. He rejoined in second after his pit stop but on lap 43 he went out with a fuel leak which caused a fire. That meant that de Cesaris was able to claim third after Cheever went out with a broken throttle. Prost finished fourth and Niki Lauda (McLaren) fifth although the Austrian was later thrown out for having reversed in the pitlane during his pit stop.

This meant that fifth place went to John Watson (McLaren) and sixth to Jacques Laffite (Williams).