EA Sports FC 26 Review – A Refined Return to Form on the Virtual Pitch

EA Sports FC 26 on PS5 Pro

The Weight of Expectation

Stepping into EA Sports FC 26, I braced myself for déjà vu. The menus, the music, even the interface feel familiar — but there’s an undercurrent of change. This isn’t EA chasing spectacle; it’s EA chasing precision. After years of stagnation, FC 26 finds its rhythm not through bombast, but through control, refinement and rhythm. The game wants you to feel football again, not just play it.

And for the first time in a while, it succeeds — at least on the pitch.

A Tale of Two Styles

The most striking change this year is the introduction of two distinct gameplay modes: Authentic and Competitive. It’s a split that defines the entire experience. Authentic plays like the slow, tactical football purists crave — methodical, patient, and weighty but still quick enough to be enjoyable. Every touch feels considered, every pass deliberate, and every gap in defence is earned.

It’s where tactics and strategies come alive much more obviously, where your every deliberate change can have an impact like what real-life managers do with their teams. You are still not going to be an armchair Pep Guardiola, but you are definitely a few degrees closer when playing in Authentic mode.

Competitive, on the other hand, is the slicker, faster counterpart — designed for online play and quick matches, with more fluid transitions and arcade-like tempo. Both work, but the catch is that Authentic is only available in offline modes. That decision hurts; it’s the better system for realism, yet you can’t take it online. It’s as if EA found balance, then locked it behind the wrong door.

Still, when it works, FC 26 delivers football that feels alive. Dribbling is tighter, passing cleaner, and movement is more believable. The awkward, weightless ball physics of previous entries have been reduced. Even goalkeepers, though still unpredictable, react with newfound humanity — sometimes brilliant, sometimes maddening.

Career Mode Finally Grows Up

If last year’s Career Mode felt like maintenance, this year’s feels like a response. The new Archetype system replaces broad stat grinding with personality. Building your player now means specialising — whether that’s a creative playmaker, a powerhouse striker, or a defensive orchestrator, giving you more purpose as you chart your way to the top.

Then comes Manager Live, a clever narrative layer that injects real-world flavour into your season. One week, you’re dealing with board expectations; the next, you’re thrown into a high-pressure rivalry match that affects morale and fan reaction. These dynamic storylines and historical moments lend a pulse to the mode, even if scouting and transfers remain mostly iterative. There’s a subtle but meaningful shift: you’re not just simulating football management anymore — you’re living it.

However, for the standard Manager Career mode, there is still very little to excite the folks hoping to prowl the touchlines. The fantasy of putting together an all-star team finally arrives with ICONs and Heroes, but that’s still a novelty at best, like Ultimate Team, but at your own pace. The evolving manager market is interesting, but your focus should always be on your own team anyway; it does add some life to the seasoned mode for those who are building up to their next club job.

What I do appreciate is the increased use of data, with EA Sports FC 26 allowing deeper data-driven simulation this year. Now, you can actually follow promising wonderkids much more effectively, make decisions backed by numbers, and show the world just how good you are at unearthing the next legend. As for Unexpected Events, where you could find a star player suddently retiring or having a sudden cash injection from new owners, add to the fun, albeit in smaller doses.

Ultimate Team: Still Addictive, Still Exhausting

No annual football game would be complete without Ultimate Team, and FC 26 continues the tug-of-war between innovation and exploitation. Credit where it’s due — Champions Playoffs are gone, Live Events shake things up, and matchmaking feels less punishing. You can sense EA listening, trying to open the gates a little wider.

Yet the shadow of monetisation looms large. Desirable players remain tucked behind grind walls or premium tiers, and the interface — despite its visual facelift — is still clunky and lag-ridden. The game’s best mode is also its most frustrating: constantly engaging, yet equally exhausting.

For those who thrive on FUT’s competitive loop, there’s plenty to chase. But for players craving football purity, it’s a reminder of how commercial this franchise has become.

Technical Ceiling

Technically, FC 26 shines brightest where it counts. Lighting and player models are cleaner, animations feel natural, and crowds finally react with believable momentum. On PlayStation 5, the game runs at a slick 60FPS, lending matches a cinematic flow as you charge up and down the pitch.

Lighting and shadows have certainly been improved as well, although you might be better off turning off the latter. In certain stadiums, the shadows cast can be somewhat distracting and can be a disadvantage you didn’t foresee. Player likeness has also seen an improvement, particularly for breakout stars at a younger age; however, there are still improvements to be made to more recognisable faces in terms of their hairstyles and other aspects.

Where FC 26 really annoys would be the menus, which can be overly convoluted for no good reason. Jumping through several menus to load a career pales in comparison to last year’s swift transition, and the UI probably didn’t need to be tweaked at all in all honesty.

Final Whistle

In many ways, EA Sports FC 26 is EA learning restraint. It’s a quieter kind of progress — one that fine-tunes rather than flaunts. The improved ball physics, refined movement, and dynamic career systems remind you why this series still dominates the pitch. However, the old frustrations persist: cluttered menus, inconsistent online balances, and a monetisation system that feels increasingly out of touch.

It’s not a reinvention. It’s a re-centring — a recalibration of what football can feel like when handled with care. And for a franchise that’s long drifted into excess, that’s a victory worth celebrating.

EA Sports FC 26 is available now on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC.