The German dived past Bottas at the first corner of the race and did not offer the Finn a single chance to come back at him, even covering off the undercut with relative ease.
Hamilton briefly looked as though he might figure at the very front of the race having started in the pit lane, but his fourth place finish remained a credit to his driving and overtaking skills.
But while Vettel had watched grimly as Hamilton celebrated the title two weeks ago, he was able to celebrate a brilliant drive and a third Brazilian Grand Prix victory.
Bottas appeared to get the better start off the line but Vettel’s secondary phase saw him draw level with the Mercedes and fired his car down the inside of Turn 1.
The Finn couldn’t even get back at him on the inside of the right-handed Turn 2 as Vettel had pulled into the lead and proceeded to maintain a two-second gap throughout the first phase of the race.
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He might have built a larger gap had a collision between Daniel Ricciardo, Kevin Magnussen and the unfortunately squeezed Stoffel Vandoorne brought out a first-lap safety car.
Only Ricciardo escaped with some of his race still intact while a separate incident saw Esteban Ocon pushed out wide and twice punctured while Romain Grosjean was handed a 10-second penalty for his part in the incident.
Vettel, who this week admitted that his petulant act behind the safety car in Baku may have in part lost him the title, perfectly controlled the restart and his only real moment of danger came when Bottas dived in for fresh tyres.
Ferrari perhaps should have pre-emptively covered off the undercut but they reacted immediately and the German emerged just ahead of the Mercedes driver before stretching the gap with apparent ease in the middle sector.
Bottas was repeatedly asked to find more pace as his tyre wear proved minimal but Vettel continued to manage his own pace.
Hamilton meanwhile briefly led the race as he delayed his stop after starting on the soft compound tyre.
The Brit eventually came in for fresh super-soft tyres and was on fresher and faster rubber than the others in front of him and with 11 laps to go, he was blocked off by Max Verstappen in Turn 1 only to get fourth place under DRS – by Turn 3 the move was done and Hamilton had Raikkonen in his sights.
However, the Mercedes’ inability to follow the 2017 beast reared its ugly head once again and the Brit could not find a way past, instead having to be satisfied with fourth.
And for all Hamilton’s brilliance, Vettel won this battle without too much effort.
But the war had of course already been won.