Prep your teams and get ready to watch the rest of 2025 vanish before your eyes, because Football Manager is back.
The 2026 version of the hit game has just been announced, along with a sneak preview of what we can expect, and safe to say we’re excited.
The game itself lets you step into the role of a football manager, tasked with managing your favourite Premier League (or otherwise) team through the rankings to trophy glory.
We don’t see much match footage in the trailer, though there we do see some in-engine visuals at work, and of course some obligatory clips of players heading out onto the field, all of which look great.
Sports Interactive and SEGA have promised that a lot of effort has gone into making the matches look better and more realistic than ever before in FM 26. The players will move more fluidly, react more organically, and the stadiums will look more detailed than ever.
SEGA has teased that the game will "take players on a journey to define their footballing destiny with our most immersive and visually rich Football Manager experience yet. The potential for storytelling is redefined by taking players closer to the heart of the beautiful game."
It’s certainly being teased as a massive leap forward to the franchise. For one, the game will finally see the introduction of women’s football teams (a feature originally slated to appear in the 2025 game), which, given the Lioness’ recent Euros win, seems especially well-timed. Plus, it’s been confirmed that the game will have a Premier League licence, which means all the league teams will be there and ready to manage.
It also seems to be console friendly. As per the announcement, FM 26 will be coming to Xbox (along with PC/Mac and mobile, as per usual), and it’ll be the first Football Manager title to run on the new Unity Engine.
In terms of the launch date, nothing’s been confirmed yet, but it’s shaping up to be the end of 2025.
Despite the 2025 game cancellation, the Football Manager franchise, which launched all the way back in 2005, has only grown in popularity in recent years. Football Manager 2024 is currently the franchise’s most-played game ever, clocking in 7 million players at the end of February 2024.
If Sports Interactive pull this one out of the bag, it looks like it could be even bigger.
