Every Forza Horizon game, ranked worst to best

Forza Horizon started as an open-world spin-off for the more established Forza Motorsport series. Now, over ten years later, it’s one of the biggest racing game franchises ever. With its stunning visuals, enormous open-world environments to explore and a wide selection of cars to collect and drive, Forza Horizon has set the gold standard for open-world racers, surpassing its Motorsport sibling in popularity. 

While each entry is set in a different location and the series has evolved since its humble beginnings on the Xbox 360, the series developed by Playground Games never strays far from its winning formula.

Across five mainline games, the Forza Horizon games let you live the fantasy of driving your dream cars in breathtaking locations, from the Australian Outback to the French Riviera, with each location filled with activities to keep you busy.  

It’s worth noting that every Forza Horizon game has been delisted since its original release, with the exception of the newest entry, Forza Horizon 5. And while there are no bad Forza Horizon games, some are better than others. Without further ado, we’ve ranked every Forza Horizon game from worst to best.

With the series heading to PS5 for the first time, we’ve ranked every Forza Horizon game from worst to best.

7. Forza Horizon 2 Presents: Fast & Furious

To coincide with the release of Fast & Furious 7 (or Furious 7 as it’s known in the US – it’s the one with the parachuting cars, the physics-defying skyscraper jump in a Lykan Hypersport and tear-jerking Paul Walker tribute), Forza Horizon 2 received free Fast & Furious-themed DLC in 2015.

What makes it unique it doesn’t require Forza Horizon 2 to play. This, therefore, isn’t a traditional DLC expansion, but a standalone game that anyone can play. Well, except that you can’t play it anymore if you didn’t buy it originally because it was delisted in 2018 and never had a physical release.

A unique campaign sees Tej (voiced by Christopher “Ludacris” Bridges in the game) recruit you to collect ten cars from the Fast & Furious films, including Dominic Toretto’s iconic 1970 Dodge Charger R/T, Brian Connor’s striking orange Toyota Supra from the first film and the Chevrolet Corvette Grand Sport from Fast Five. All ten cars were later released in a separate DLC pack for Forza Horizon 2. There were also challenges loosely inspired by the films taking place in a restricted section of Forza Horizon 2’s French map.

It’s also notable for being the first and only Forza game with camera-shaking nitro boosts. While there are no absurd set pieces like the films, it’s a better attempt at a Fast & Furious game than the farcical Fast & Furious Crossroads.

6. Forza Horizon 2 (Xbox 360)

Alongside the Xbox One release, Forza Horizon 2 received a lesser-known Xbox 360 port. Instead of Playground Games, it was helmed by Sumo Digital, known for its revered racing titles like Sonic & All Stars Racing Transformed and OutRun 2006: Coast 2 Coast.

Although both versions share the same location, they have completely different engines under the bonnet. Whereas the Xbox One versions takes advantage of the more powerful Xbox One hardware with a new engine, the Xbox 360 version reused the first game’s older engine.

As a result, the graphics were a noticeable downgrade, and key new features like weather effects, tuning, Drivatar AI, car meets and cross-country racing were absent. More areas were also closed off, making the map feel smaller in scope. Oddly, a handful of cars like the Bugatti EB110 were initially exclusive to the Xbox 360 port but were later released as DLC for the Xbox One game. There was also an exclusive Showcase event that saw you race a helicopter in a Bowler EXR-S off-roader.

Forza Horizon 2’s Xbox 360 port is inferior in every way. Even so, seeing the sacrifices made to get Forza Horizon 2 running on Xbox 360 is interesting.

5. Forza Horizon

It’s hard to imagine now, but the idea of Forza going open-world was risky when Forza Horizon was announced in 2012. Back then, Forza was synonymous with motorsport and track racing. After all, Forza Motorsport was conceived as Microsoft’s answer to Gran Turismo. Thankfully, the gamble paid off. Playground Games’ open-world experiment exceeded expectations.

Based on Forza Motorsport 4’s engine, Forza Horizon blended semi-realistic driving with an expansive map set in Colorado and a vibrant music festival.    

Several features introduced in the first game have become series staples, such as barn finds, where you discover and restore abandoned cars. It also introduced high-octane Showcase events, which pit you against unusual vehicles, including a Mustang plane and a hot air balloon in the first game. Showcase events have become even more epic since the first game, with standouts including racing a hovercraft, fighter jets and even the Flying Scotsman.

Forza Horizon’s murky visuals and lacklustre lighting show its age, but its recreation of Colorado is still worth revisiting. There’s a tangible and satisfying sense of progression that newer entries lack.

You start as a newcomer, collecting festival wristbands as you work your way up while meeting memorable characters and rivals. Although the intro tricks you by putting you behind the wheel of a Dodge SRT Viper, earning money and unlocking faster cars takes time. Case in point: you start in a compact Volkswagen Corrado, not a swanky supercar.

4. Forza Horizon 5

The latest entry in the open-world franchise, Forza Horizon 5 features sensational graphics, a diverse and a comprehensive car roster. But that doesn’t make it the best game in the series. A lack of innovation sometimes makes it feel like a Forza Horizon 4 reskin.

Set in Mexico, the map is massive and diverse, featuring dense jungles, sandy deserts and ancient ruins. You can even climb up a volcano – the highest point in any Forza Horizon game. And yet it feels empty compared to the first game’s rousing festival atmosphere. 

With over 900 cars, Forza Horizon 5 has one of the largest and most eclectic car rosters in a modern racing game, with new models like the Mercedes-AMG One hypercar and sixth-generation Ford Bronco SUV making their Forza debuts.

However, there’s arguably too much choice – an issue that also plagues the campaign. Forza Horizon 5 gives you so much to do, but with no clear path, it gets overwhelming. With repetitive events and side missions cluttering the map, it feels overstuffed.

Even the DLC seemed recycled: did we need another Hot Wheels expansion after Forza Horizon 3’s?

That said, Forza Horizon 5’s post-launch support was superb. Over the last three years, monthly season updates have added new cars and game modes to keep the game fresh and dedicated players returning.

Not every season was a winner, and the weekly festival playlists can sometimes feel like a chore, but Playground Games’ consistency is commendable. EventLabs has also breathed new life into the series, with playlists highlighting the best community-created tracks.

Thanks to a day-one Game Pass release, Forza Horizon 5 became the biggest Xbox Game Studio launch, with over ten million players visiting its virtual Mexico in the first week. Staggeringly, that number has increased to over 40 million since launch, making Forza Horizon 5 one of this generation’s most popular racing games. Its popularity won’t slow down either when new players discover the series in Forza Horizon 5’s surprise PS5 port.

Despite its shortcomings, Forza Horizon 5 is a fantastic open-world racer with an unrivalled car list and production values. But at this point, the formula was starting to feel stale. Let’s hope the inevitable Forza Horizon 6 can take the series in a fresh new direction.  

3. Forza Horizon 2 (Xbox One)

Forza Horizon 2 expanded on the original game’s foundation, with the Horizon Festival moving to Southern France and Northern Italy. While the map isn’t as diverse as other games in the series, driving along sweeping coastal roads and travelling between locations felt like an epic road trip from Top Gear or The Grand Tour. 

The sequel literally broke down the first game’s barriers, with smashable roadside fences allowing you to tear across fields and find shortcuts, providing a greater sense of freedom. These more open areas were highlighted in extended road trips and off-road-focused Cross Country events.

With the series shifting to the new-generation Xbox One, the visuals were spellbinding, with exceptional lighting effects and exquisitely detailed car models. This made Forza Horizon 2 one of the generation’s best-looking driving games, and the visuals still hold up today.

Forza Horizon 2’s seamless online multiplayer, allowing you to switch between offline and online with no loading screens, was an impressive feat at the time, and the sequel also introduced dynamic weather effects before the Forza Motorsport series.   

However, compared to the first game, Forza Horizon 2’s structure feels less like a music festival, and the characters are more annoying. You’ll want to smack the smarmy Ben Miller, host of the Horizon Festival, after the first cut scene.

2. Forza Horizon 3

Forza Horizon 3 added a new twist to the increasingly familiar formula. This time, you were the Horizon Festival boss rather than a newcomer, with the freedom to expand and customise the festival as you acquired more fans. This gave Forza Horizon 3 a clear structure – something the latest entry sorely lacks. 

With the festival travelling down under to Australia, the terrain variety was vaster than ever, from sandy beaches to dense rainforests. In a first for the series, you could explore the environment cooperatively with friends in single-player events. Playground Games even recorded Australia’s real sky for several months with an expensive 12K HDR camera rig to make the environment and lighting look authentic.  

Australia’s rich car culture was well represented, allowing you to drive everything from the Holden Sandman HQ Panel Van and the Ford XB Falcon GT muscle car, a.k.a. the famous V8 Interceptor from Mad Max.

Alternatively, you could take the Lamborghini Centenario cover car for a top speed run or roll over a Reliant Regal Supervan. There was something for everyone.   

Customisation was also expanded, with the ability to apply widebody kits for the first time.

Forza Horizon 3’s post-launch expansions were excellent, too. Long before Milestone’s Hot Wheels Unleashed series came onto the scene, the Hot Wheels expansion added an extra island with life-sized stunt tracks featuring loops, corkscrews and boost pads. Blizzard Mountain, on the other hand, introduced treacherous snow driving.

For many fans, Forza Horizon 3 is the franchise’s peak. But it’s not our overall winner.

1. Forza Horizon 4

When the Traxion team debated ranking every Forza Horizon game, there was one unanimous winner: Forza Horizon 4. Sadly, we said farewell to Playground Games’ open-world masterpiece last December when it was delisted from digital stores.   

Perhaps the UK setting, or “beautiful historic Britain,” as Playground Games loved to remind us, makes us biased. With the studio based in Leamington Spa, Playground Games could spend more time crafting the environment, and it showed. From the smashable stone walls to the authentic road signs, the attention to detail was astounding. Every area was distinct, whether you were tearing up idyllic country roads or visiting a faithful recreation of Edinburgh’s town centre (which is eerily empty without pedestrians).

Notably, Forza Horizon 4 introduced changeable seasons, with every in-game week switching between spring, summer, autumn and winter. These changes were not only visual; they dynamically affected the environment, with freezing lakes in winter and dying rivers in summer creating new driving routes. It perfectly captured a chilly, frosty morning without the hassle of de-icing your car.  

Elsewhere, the car roster celebrated the best of British motoring, featuring everything from the savage McLaren Senna cover car to the classic Mini Cooper. Or you could potter around the English countryside in a Peel P50 microcar. Multiplayer was also expanded with the popular Eliminator mode, and weekly festival playlists introduced live service updates with regular rewards and challenges. This format would carry over to Forza Horizon 5.

On the downside, Forza Horizon 4 introduced the divisive Wheelspins, which showered you with car prizes too regularly, diluting the sense of progression and reward. Forza Horizon 4 is not perfect, then, but it’s our favourite in the series.

Do you agree with our Forza Horizon game rankings? Which is your favourite game in the series? Let us know in the comments below.