Where Storytelling Evolves: FM26's Match Day Experience

Richer On-Pitch Visuals

When experiencing your first match in FM26, you’ll immediately notice the significant changes to our on-pitch visuals and the highest level of graphical fidelity in the series. 

Whatever the kick-off time, every match feels different thanks to a revamp of our lighting. These lighting changes are combined with new sky effects, adding more depth and realism to the brightness, contrasts and shadows that you experience based on the time of day and season.

The FM26 experience is also elevated by a new pitch shader. This enables more detailed and authentic-looking surfaces, and makes weather effects like rain and snow much more evident. 

Off the pitch, a change in approach to stadium design breathes new life into every Match Day from elite arenas to lower-league grounds. We’ve also done significant new work on the environments around your ground as well, meaning that your team’s home ground now better reflects the location, stature and standing of your club. 

New Animations, More Personality

Now for the matches themselves, where you’ll experience more authenticity and personality in every attack thanks to the addition of hundreds of new player animations. 

These are on-the-ball, volumetric animations directly taken from real-life matches by our partners at Hawk-Eye Innovations, encompassing dribbles, passes, shots and more. These animations dovetail with the off-the-ball animations we added to FM24, and our own bespoke motion capture, to create more natural and authentic gameplay across every match in FM26. 

It’s not simply a case of taking the data for Hawk-Eye footage and plugging it into the game, though. We’ve also made significant upgrades to our own technology that blends the animations together based on the context of the match situation. This means that dribbling is enhanced, with players now changing their running style to move more naturally on the pitch and making smoother footwork adjustments. Under the hood, the Dribbling AI tech has been overhauled too, with attackers now having the ability to stand up defenders and bait them in before taking them on. 

Our work on animations also includes goalkeepers. Here, we’ve mixed in motion capture with real-world physics modelling to create more lifelike motion for those working between the posts. 

Beyond movement, we’ve made significant changes to the way that pass risk is assessed. This means that your players should be better able to play passes through traffic and between the lines in the middle of the pitch.

All of these improvements for FM26 apply to both Men’s and Women’s football, with the differences in how men and women move reflected with the inclusion of new character models, kit settings and hairstyles. 

There's also been extensive work on the AI in the Match Engine itself alongside further AI changes to support FM26’s new tactical tools, all of which you’ll learn about in a forthcoming deep dive. 

A More Immersive Match Experience

No matter who you’re managing, you’ll feel closer to every moment that matters thanks to a rebuilt camera system that changes the way you experience every game with a much wider range of angles across the pitch. Inspired by real-life TV coverage, we’ve added a new Broadcast mode that combines multiple camera points and all-new cinematic angles to give you the best view of the action every time. 

Replays are also significantly revamped as part of our camera work, with a range of bespoke new angles added. FM26 now uses information on the type of goal scored to determine the replay you’re shown, ensuring you get the perfect perspective on your team’s breakthroughs - no matter how they hit the back of the net. 

That’s not all – let’s introduce you to Dynamic Highlight Mode

An innovative addition for FM26, Dynamic Highlight mode adjusts the number of highlights you see based on the context of the match you’re in. The more important and more dramatic a game, the more highlights you’ll see. If you’re already 4-0 up and closing in on victory, the number of highlights will drop accordingly. 

Dynamic Highlight Mode levels up the immersion, delivering more suspense and a more exciting viewing experience. 

Whether you’re in Dynamic Highlights or another mode, if you listen up you’ll notice that FM26 has had an audio revamp too. More real sounds have been added, allowing you to feel the rush of anticipation as your team goes on the attack and the elation of going a goal up on your rivals. 

And when you’re between highlights, there’s a brand-new Match Overview screen for you to enjoy. To give you a clearer picture of the state of the match and your team’s performance before you’re drawn back into the action, we’ve embedded the classic 2D pitch view.

Alongside this, you’ll get the insight from your backroom team and the latest from around the league, with expandable data cards powering decision-making and tactical tweaks. All of the advice you receive in the dugout, both pre-match and during the action, has been improved for FM26. Everything now factors in our latest statistics, such as expected goals (xG) and expected assists (xA), and all previous advice has been re-evaluated to make it more intelligent and useful. Those pointers are joined by a number of new additions that will help give you an edge over your opponents. For example, with better contextual understanding of matches, your assistant manager might now suggest you lower your tempo if you’re winning comfortably towards the end of the match to conserve the energy of your players and take the sting out of the game. 

Celebrating Success

The anticipation of the biggest matches and the elation of victory are essential to every FM save and now you’ll feel more immersed in them thanks to wholesale changes to cutscenes. 

Every pre-match and post-match has been remade for FM26, with a host of new additions that show off the full experience in our biggest licences like the Premier League and UEFA Club Competitions. 

These cutscenes are more detailed and visually vivid than ever, with camera work and new features such as depth of field and Steadicam adding more realism and authenticity to things like match balls and trophies. 

FM26 brings wholesale changes to the entire match experience, from the match environments your teams play in to the way your players move on the ball. Everything has been done to level up your immersion in the action and elevate the theatre of the big occasions. 

So step into the dugout where every match tells its story. It’s time to change the game.