The maximum number of riders per team in the modern Tour de France is 8.
The change took effect in 2018, when the Union Cycliste Internationale reduced Grand Tour team sizes from nine riders to eight. The Tour’s 22 teams therefore produced a starting field of 176 riders that year. The smaller squads were intended to reduce the peloton’s size and make racing more competitive and safer.
This rule concerns the riders entered for the race, not everyone employed by a team. A professional squad may include reserve riders, coaches, mechanics, soigneurs, doctors and sports directors, but only eight cyclists can start for that team in the Tour. If riders abandon during the race, the team does not replace them, so a squad can finish with fewer than eight.
The number is easy to confuse with the older format: before 2018, Tour teams generally started with nine riders. Eight remains the modern maximum for each Tour team, although the total number of teams and invited squads can vary between editions.