Football Manager 26 reviews paint Sports Interactive’s big new start as the worst entry in 16 years

Football Manager 26 man and player standing in front of a burning stadium

Published:

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Last Updated: 31 October 2025

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By:

Lewis White

Sports Interactive’s Football Manager 26 has not launched in a great state. Following the cancellation of last year’s entry, FM26 was supposed to be a bold new start for the future of the series, but the game has sadly landed like a lead balloon.

With a huge list of missing features over previous games and modders already coming to the rescue, the game has been heavily criticised for a slow, cumbersome UI and a great deal of bugs. Unfortunately, these issues have been reflected in the game’s early review scores.

While every FM has seen its share of issues, Football Manager 26 has more than its fair share. With review scores still piling in, Sports Interactive’s latest entry has launched with the lowest rated Metacritic score of any mainline entry in the past 16 years.

At the time of publication, FM26 sits at an average score of 72 on Metacritic, a mixed or average reception according to the publication. While still a good score, it is the lowest-rated mainline entry in the series available on the platform.

Currently, the highest score comes from outlet SpazioGames which gave the new management sim an 85/100, but with a score of 60/100 from the lads at Radio Times and an even lower 50/100 from IGN Portugal, it’s not looking strong for the new game.

Fortunately, FM26 is reviewing higher than developer Sports Interactive’s worst reviewed game on Metacritic: Football Manager Handheld 2012’s historically rough PSP port. However, it’s from the heights of Football Manager 2010 which sits at a magnificent 87/100 on the platform. Hang on, I’ll just make a table. It’s easier.

Football Manager GamesAverage Metacritic Score
Football Manager 202672
Football Manager 202484
Football Manager 202380
Football Manager 202285
Football Manager 202185
Football Manager 202084
Football Manager 201986
Football Manager 201882
Football Manager 201780
Football Manager 201681
Football Manager 201580
Football Manager 201485
Football Manager 201386
Football Manager 201284
Football Manager 201185
Football Manager 201087

While Sports Interactive may have dropped the ball with this latest entry, Football Manager has an extremely consistent quality bar every single year. If you look at the review scores for every single mainline entry (not including this year’s game), they all sit very closely to each other in terms of critic reviews.

As SI has said over and over again, FM26 is the start of something brand new, and that does come with teething problems. Hopefully, these issues will be solved by next year’s game. If not, then the alarm bells can – and should ring – but hopefully, this time, Sports Interactive is simply having an off season.

About The Author

Lewis White

Lewis White is a veteran games journalist with over a decade in the field. Starting with beloved Xbox website ICXM/XboxMAD, Lewis became the Gaming Editor at MSPoweruser before becoming the Editor in Chief of StealthOptional and Gfinityesports. Lewis later jumped to By Gamers For Gamers where he jumped to become EIC of VideoGamer and the host of the New VideoGamer Podcast prior to the website’s acquisition.

Over the years, Lewis has also seen long-form investigative pieces published in outlets such as Eurogamer, PCGamesN, Wireframe, Retro Gamer, Nintendo Life, and EDGE. Now, as the Editor in Chief of FRVR Blog, Lewis strives to bring the same level of quality journalism with interview-led content to the site in both written and audio form with the FRVR Podcast.

With a First Degree BA Hons in Games Journalism and Public Relations, Lewis has been a stable part of the British games press for over a decade, and has frequently displayed his love of Halo, The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, and other games pretty much everywhere he’s worked. And FRVR is no different.

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