Steam Community :: Football Manager 26

FM26 Update 5 Available Now via Steam Public Beta Track

Dec 10

Following a recent major content update, we can confirm that another update is now available, initially via the Steam Public Beta Track.

Included within the 300+ changes, there have been further improvements to player and staff contract logic, under the hood improvements to game stability, and improved post-match and past match report screens.

For instructions on how to access and download the update, please visit our guide here. [community.sports-interactive.com]

To address some of the conversation around the purpose of the Public Beta Track, this channel provides us with an opportunity to get changes out to a large group of players at the very earliest opportunity. Unless critical, feedback raised during this phase is then actioned with subsequent updates in mind.

You can find the changelist (English only), here[community.sports-interactive.com].

Football Manager 26

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75

FM26 is dying

Steam player numbers have dropped below 50k for a 24 hour peak. That's down from 85k and its only been out for a month! https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3623077468 The chart shows that the trend is consistent. +/- 10k players a week are abandoning the game, there isn't even a noticeable spike when patches drop. The game is on track to lose HALF of its peak player numbers in the next week or so. FM is in unprecedented territory....

10

SALVO

3 hours ago

General Discussions

FM26 Update 26.1.0 Out Now

Dec 8

Following a successful rollout of the update via the Steam Public Beta Track, we’re pleased to confirm that Football Manager 26 update 26.1.0 is now available on Steam, Epic, and Microsoft Store.

This major update brings the most substantial number of changes, bug fixes, and feature introductions so far this cycle, with an emphasis on enhancing immersion and player experience. Shouts are back, the Match Engine has been fine-tuned, and we’ve made tweaks to the variety and relevance of the News shown in the Portal.

And for the very first time in the series, Football Manager is now available to play in Arabic.

Some of the highlights of update 26.1.0 are as follows:

Matchday Shouts

Updated Match Engine with various improvements

Extensive polish and refinement done to the User Interface

Fully customisable attribute colouring

Various tweaks and improvements to transfers

Added ability to schedule friendlies for Youth teams

Updated various Competitions and Rules

Improvements to the News shown on the ‘For You’ News tab

Functionality to import/export attribute templates on the In Game Editor

For queries about how to update on these platforms, please review this FAQ[support.sega.com].

For Steam Public Beta track users, please consult the FAQ[community.sports-interactive.com] for any questions about how to revert to the retail version and save game compatibility.

You can find the changelist, here[community.sports-interactive.com].

Football Manager 26

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FM26 Update 4 Available Now via Steam Public Beta Track

Dec 4

As promised in our preview[community.sports-interactive.com] earlier this week, we are pleased to confirm that an update has been rolled out to the Steam Public Beta Branch.

For instructions on how to access and download the update, please visit our guide, here[community.sports-interactive.com].

This update brings a wealth of bug fixes, improvements, and features:

Matchday Shouts

Updated Match Engine with various improvements

Extensive polish and refinement done to the User Interface

Fully customisable attribute colouring

Various tweaks and improvements to transfers

Added ability to schedule friendlies for Youth teams

Updated various Competitions and Rules

Improvements to the News shown on the ‘For You’ News tab

Functionality to import/export attribute templates on the In Game Editor

The majority of the changes in this update will be immediately compatible with existing save games, but most Competition & Rules changes will only take effect from the following season, with some needing a new save file entirely.

We aim to make this update available on all platforms next week, following our usual checks and submission process.

You can view the changelist (English only), here[community.sports-interactive.com].

Football Manager 26

569

111

Artwork

Award

114

5

FAKE af

SALVO

View artwork

Artwork

Award

98

1

RIP Football Manager

Obamasqué

View artwork

Guide

FM26 Real Name Fix Guide

This guide will show you how to get the real names into Football Manager 26. Fake names are used within the game due to licensing restrictions but this will fix it.

42 ratings

10

TGW Jamie

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Artwork

Award

40

28

WHAT HAPPEN

leunglailok

View artwork

Everytime they "fix" one thing, it breaks something else

there is only one way to describe how the game has been handled the last two years, and that's incomitance. any other job and people would have been sacked weeks/months ago. no surprise playing figures are dropping link bonnie blues underwear

5

rbaldw

4 hours ago

General Discussions

9 people found this review helpful

Not Recommended

190.4 hrs on record

Posted: December 9

I’ve been playing this game for years, and after a year-long break in releases I was hoping for a solid comeback. Instead, what we got is so bug-ridden that Cyberpunk 2077 feels like a minor issue in comparison. Honestly, this game deserves not just a refund, but compensation—regardless of how many hours you’ve already spent in it.

For veteran players, the new interface is a disaster. Even after 150–170 hours, it remains painfully unintuitive, clearly designed with consoles in mind. Instead of enjoying the core gameplay, you waste endless time navigating frustrating menus and tabs.

The game engine is broken. Players constantly make ridiculous, nonsensical moves. The offside system is a joke—every match the same bug repeats. VAR checks, then we get a replay where the offside is obvious, but the system and AI draw the line however they please. Is this supposed to be the new standard?

The graphics and flashy pre-release trailers looked like a slick TV ad, but once you actually play, the product feels unfinished. On top of that, the lack of proper localization in 2025 is unacceptable. And while I understand the “woke” world we live in, seeing female pronouns during player motivation scenes when I’m playing as a male coach is just embarrassing for a €60 launch title.

Proudy

0

Legends and players from the past

I've always left my gameplays as soon as my club is filled with randomly created players. Could be a good idea to use old player, really existed in football history, instead of randomly generated ones? Any suggestion abut this idea would be appreciated. Thanks...

7

SenzaPazienza

6 hours ago

General Discussions

Guide

How to remove women/mens leagues

By default football manager will enable both the men's and womens league of each nation you choose to have in your save. However this causes an increase in simulation time and is redundant if you know you are only going to play as a manager of a single clu...

37 ratings

7

Ace The Kangaroo

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Guide

Player Personality and Media Handling Style Guide

A guide to understand player personalities, media handling styles and how to scout personalities in FM26. This guide will help you to understand the potential of players both on the field and on the training ground. This guide uses information from https:/...

27 ratings

11

[PEQ] Beni

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Youve killed the game

No background picture, custom skins a nightmare, the whole setup the game ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ stinks. Played this for over 20 years and its gone to ♥♥♥♥ WELL DONE FOR KILLING what made this game so addictive. Wasnt going to buy the game based on this years reviews and reading the build up to this years release after the last years FAILURE....but to be sure i did what ive done for TWENTY YEARS and bought the game and to say im pissed is an understatement...I WANT MY ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ MONEY BACK...It seems the consistency has fai...

5

gareth.moore83

7 hours ago

General Discussions

7 people found this review helpful

Not Recommended

100.5 hrs on record

Posted: December 7

FM26 Review – “A Masterclass in How to Alienate Your Most Loyal Players”

I’ve played every single game in this series since Championship Manager 04.
For two decades, Football Manager has been my comfort game — reliable, familiar, and consistently enjoyable. And honestly, SI had the easiest fanbase in the world to satisfy. Every year they released more or less the same game with small improvements and updated squads, and that was perfectly fine. Nobody was asking for a revolution.

But instead of refining what already worked, Sports Interactive decided to “evolve” the franchise for the console market. And that’s exactly where FM26 completely falls apart.

The new UI isn’t just bad — it’s fundamentally the wrong design for this game.

This isn’t about performance or optimisation (although those are also below expectations).
The real issue is the design itself:

It’s unintuitive and clunky.

It slows down even the simplest interactions.

Key information is buried behind too many layers.

It feels terrible to use with a mouse.

And ironically, it still feels awkward with a controller.

I’m playing on a handheld (Legion Go), and navigating the UI is honestly painful.
Everything takes longer, everything feels heavier, and nothing feels natural.
The so-called “streamlined” interface somehow manages to be inefficient on both PC and controller — which is an achievement in the worst possible way.

The most frustrating part?
SI already had a great controller-friendly version: FM Touch.
Lightweight, fast, intuitive — a perfect fit for consoles and handhelds.
Instead of improving it, they scrapped it and forced everyone into one unified interface designed to work everywhere… and in the end, it works nowhere.

Performance issues aren’t the problem — the design is.

You can patch FPS.
You can fix stutters.
But you can’t patch a fundamentally flawed UX philosophy.
FM26 feels like a product built around the wrong priorities and aimed at an audience that doesn’t exist.

In short:

SI tried to create one universal version of FM for PC, consoles, and handhelds.
Instead, they ended up with a version that doesn’t feel right on any platform.

As someone who has been with this series since the Championship Manager days, FM26 is the first time I genuinely feel disappointed. And judging by the reviews, I’m far from alone.

nettmanek

113 products in account

1

Guide

Playing Time Happiness Tricks

A simple trick to change player's agreed time without upsetting them

0

[D]oc

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Guide

How to choose the best players for each position

There's a lot of attributes in the game, but some have more impact than others. The game is unintuitive like that. So here's a cheatsheet position-by-position to help you sift through that mountain of scout recommendations. The underlying game remains a va...

2

Gûts

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8 people found this review helpful

Recommended

170.8 hrs on record

Posted: December 9

I've been playing this game and it's previous iteration since CM Italia 95/96. I played one historic beta and did not have high hopes that the beta would be...good. It goes without saying it was laden with issues and was far worse than any of us expected. The reaction from everyone was frenzied and vitriolic and, if we are being honest, was fuelled by the non-release of FM25. The match engine is better. The UI was a shock to the system at first but you can handle it if you treat it like a new game.

Now the updates have gone through it's a good game, and it should only get better as time goes on (or at the very least this game now will act as a baseline for future releases). The game was rightly bashed when it came out but it would not have got to this stage without User Acceptance Testing.

I didn't start my usual journeyman save until I had confidence it would work and am now 4 seasons in to one of my most enjoyable saves in the last few years. Use the workshop, add lower leagues in if you want to make your game more realistic, manage PSG, take the women's leagues out, play the game however you get enjoyment for it.

If you usually buy the game but have held off, now is a good time to get it.