F1 games: career, online, and how they differ

The current official F1 game is F1 25 (EA Sports / Codemasters), and for the first time since 2008 there is no standalone annual release. Instead, the 2026 regulations arrive as a 2026 Season Pack DLC for F1 25 in early June 2026, with a fully reimagined F1 game planned for 2027. Existing owners buy the expansion; newcomers get “F1 25: 2026 Season Edition.” It is a simcade single-seater game with a deep career and a broad assist range, and it remains the on-ramp most people use before moving to a dedicated sim.

The game modes

Driver Career

You can climb from F2 to F1 as yourself, or play as a real driver. Icon drivers like Schumacher and Senna can be AI-recruited onto the grid, so you can build a fantasy field. Career drives R&D, contract negotiation, and a full season with practice, qualifying, and race weekends. Bugs are worth knowing about: PS5 career save issues and “ERS completely inactive” reports have circulated, and two-player co-op career still drops connections.

My Team 2.0

My Team has changed shape. You are now the team owner and principal only, not also a driver. You allocate driver skill and manage a budget cap across a two-driver roster instead of inserting yourself into the car. It plays more like a management layer than the old player-plus-team hybrid.

Online and ranked

Online runs through the F1 World hub: ranked lobbies, social lobbies, custom Grand Prix, Time Trial, and a livery/decal editor, with cross-play. Random ranked races are rough. Turn-1 pileups are routine, ranked matchmaking can be thin, and connection and online-service complaints are common. If you want clean racing, join a Discord-organized league. That is where the consistent, penalty-enforced fields actually are.

Is the F1 game a sim?

It is simcade, and the honest version is that it scales. The assist and difficulty spectrum is wide: AI from 0 to 110, traction control off/medium/full, ABS on or off, the racing line, ERS/fuel/pit assists, and dynamic versus fixed setups. Full assists with low AI lets you dominate and have fun; no assists with ~90+ AI on a wheel is genuinely demanding. Either way the tire model is more forgiving and the car recovers from slides more readily than in iRacing or ACC. It will not punish a sloppy mid-corner correction the way those sims do.

Controller vs wheel

Controller is fully viable here, which sets the F1 series apart from almost every dedicated sim. F1 esports has historically been played on pads, and you can be competitive with one. Assisted braking is slower than threshold braking with ABS off, so dropping the brake assist is the single biggest pace gain once you can manage lockups.

Force feedback is the recurring complaint. It is widely called flat and weak next to ACC, iRacing, or AC, and console FFB on Logitech wheels draws the loudest criticism. Supported wheels include the Logitech G29/G923/G Pro, Fanatec, Moza, and Thrustmaster T300/T-GT across PS5, PC, and Xbox. If a Moza spins on its own or a G Pro feels dead, that is the game’s FFB model and your tuning, not a broken wheel. See force feedback settings for how to claw back detail.

What carries over to a real sim

The transferable skills are real. Braking points and reference markers, trail braking discipline, the racing line, tire and fuel management, pit strategy and undercut/overcut thinking, ERS deployment logic, and wheel muscle memory if you run without assists all move with you. What does not carry over is the feel: players jumping to iRacing or ACC report the cars sit far more on-edge, slides do not self-correct, and the FFB suddenly tells you what the front tires are doing. Treat F1 25 as a strategy and racecraft trainer, not a physics trainer.

2026 Season Pack: what’s changing

The June 3, 2026 expansion brings the real 2026 regulations and a new physics model to match. The grid expands to 11 teams as Audi and Cadillac join, with a custom 12th slot in My Team. Cars are smaller, lighter, and about 15% lower with slightly less grip; active aero opens the front and rear wings to cut drag; and a new “overtake” boost worth nearly 500 hp replaces the DRS-style system and is usable anywhere on the lap, not just in a zone. Hybrid power is weighted further toward electric. The pack also adds the new MADRING circuit in Madrid, the first new track on the F1 calendar since 2023, drivable only with the 2026 cars.