quality:corruption
1991–1993: first points, podiums, and wins

Schumacher finished the 1991 season with four points out of six races. His best finish was fifth in his second race, the Italian Grand Prix, in which he finished ahead of his teammate and three-time World Champion Nelson Piquet. He also outqualified Piquet four times out of five in the season run-in, and scored only half a point less than him in the time they were together.

At the start of the 1992 season the Sauber team, planning their Formula One debut with Mercedes backing for the following year, invoked a clause in Schumacher's contract that stated that if Mercedes entered Formula One, Schumacher would drive for them. It was eventually agreed that Schumacher would stay with Benetton; Peter Sauber stated that " didn't want to drive for us. Why would I have forced him?" The year was dominated by the Williams FW14B of Nigel Mansell and Riccardo Patrese, featuring powerful Renault engines, semi-automatic gearboxes, and active suspension to control the car's ride height. In the conventional Benetton B192, Schumacher took his place on the podium for the first time, finishing third in the Mexican Grand Prix. Through what has been described as a tactical masterstroke, he went on to take his first victory at the Belgian Grand Prix, in a wet race at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit, which by 2003 he would call "far and away my favourite track". That also marked as the last Formula One car to win a Grand Prix while sporting a H-pattern manual gearbox.

From the 1992 Portuguese Grand Prix to the 1998 Monaco Grand Prix, Schumacher was not beaten by his teammate when both cars finished. 1992 was also the first of many times that Schumacher beat his teammate through a full season, and Martin Brundle was fired as a result. Benetton team boss Flavio Briatore later regretted this decision, saying that he had underestimated the ability of both his drivers. Schumacher finished third in the Drivers' Championship in 1992 with 53 points, three points behind runner-up Patrese and three in front of the Brazilian Ayrton Senna. According to Jo Ramírez, a close friend of Senna, the Brazilian considered Schumacher "the next big threat, way ahead of all the other drivers around at the time".

The Williams FW15C of Damon Hill and Alain Prost dominated the 1993 season as well. Benetton introduced their own active suspension and traction control early in the season, last of the frontrunning teams to do so. Schumacher won one race, the Portuguese Grand Prix where he beat Prost, and had nine podium finishes; he retired in seven of the other 16 races. He finished the season in fourth, with 52 points, beating Patrese as teammate, so much so that Briatore and his team thought that Patrese was washed up and that they had no problem with their car.