The Australian GT Championship has confirmed a 28 car field for the opening round of the season at the Clipsal 500 next month.

Seven manufacturers will be represented on the grid courtesy of 26 championship class cars and two invitational entries for the Adelaide event from March 3-6.

Reigning champion Christopher Mies will return to defend his title behind the wheel of the Jamec Pem Racing Audi R8, with the Ingolstadt marque also represented by Steve McLaughlan, James Koundouris, Rod Salmon, Greg Taylor and Barton Mawer and Simon Ellingham.

Maranello Motorsport will field a Ferrari 458 for Tony D’Alberto and Grant Denyer with the Melbourne operation set to debut its new 488 GT3 at the Australian Grand Prix meeting.

The new Mercedes AMG GT3 will make its first competitive appearance in Australia with Scott Taylor Motorsport fielding a car for team owner Scott Taylor and Craig Baird.

Meanwhile, Mark Griffith will jump behind the wheel of a Erebus Motorsport prepared AMG GT3.

WALTEC Motorsport has a Porsche GT3-R entered for John Martin and Aaron Tebb, while Andrew Macpherson will steer the AMAC Racing GT3-R.

Walkinshaw Racing is due to debut their 2016 specification Porsche GT3-R at Barbagallo Raceway in May.

Tony Walls’ Objective Racing McLaren 650S will be on the grid with Tony Quinn and Klark Quinn sharing a sister 650S.

Tony Quinn will pilot a brand new Aston Martin Vantage GT3 for the rest of the season from the Australian Grand Prix meeting onwards.

Lamborghini will field five cars spread across two models with three R-EXs and two Gallardo FLIIs entered.

Andrew Taplin and Dean Canto will share the Taplin Motorsport entered R-EX while Roger Lago will take the controls of his own Lago Racing R-EX.

M Motorsport will prepare cars for Justin McMillan, John Magro and Hayden Cooper.

Peter Rullo will share with son Alex in their Performance West Lamborghini Gallardo FLII.

In the Invitational class, Keith Wong will race a Porsche GT3 Cup MY11, while Brenton Griguol will compete in the Bank SA Ferrari F430 GT3.

A full entry list is expected to be revealed next week.