Gran Turismo 7 vs Forza Motorsport: Two Sim Racers, Two Very Different Fates
In 2026 one console racing sim was still getting new cars, tracks and a paid expansion four years after launch. The other had stopped growing entirely. How Gran Turismo 7 and Forza Motorsport ended up on opposite sides of the pit wall.
For twenty years, console racing had a simple rivalry. PlayStation had Gran Turismo, the "real driving simulator" from Kazunori Yamauchi's Polyphony Digital. Xbox had Forza Motorsport, Turn 10's answer, which arrived in 2005 and spent two decades trying to out-detail its rival. Every generation, fans argued about tyre models, car counts and which one had the better Nürburgring.
In 2026 that argument quietly ended, and not because one game won on the track. Gran Turismo 7, now more than four years old, is still receiving new cars, circuits and a paid expansion. Forza Motorsport, released in 2023, stopped receiving new content in December 2025. Here is how two games built for the same purpose ended up on such different paths, and what it means if you love racing in a straight line very fast.
Gran Turismo 7: the long game
Gran Turismo 7 launched on March 4, 2022 on PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5. It was directed by series creator Kazunori Yamauchi, and its centrepiece was the Café, a menu-book campaign that walks you through car culture one collection at a time. Critics loved the driving: it scored 87 on Metacritic for PS5 and 82 for PS4. Players were angrier about its economy and always-online requirement, and the game picked up a notably poor user score, but sales were strong. It was the best-selling game of its launch week in the UK and Japan.
What made GT7 different was what came after. Most Gran Turismo games had been finished products with a few patches; GT7 was planned to evolve. Polyphony kept adding to it, month after month, in a way the series had never done before.
- On February 20, 2023, update 1.29 added full PlayStation VR2 support for free.
- On November 2, 2023, the Spec II update arrived with seven new cars, a new track and an upgraded version of Gran Turismo Sophy, Sony AI's racing opponent. Sophy 2.0 could now race in 340 cars, covering 95% of the game's models, across nine tracks, up from four cars and four tracks in its first preview.
- On December 6, 2024, Polyphony released My First Gran Turismo, a free starter game with 18 cars and three tracks whose unlocked cars carry over into GT7.
Spec III and the Power Pack
The biggest moment came on December 4, 2025 with Spec III (update 1.65), GT7's second major overhaul. It added eight cars, from the Ferrari 296 GT3 to the gloriously odd Renault Espace F1 '95, a family minivan with a Formula 1 engine. It added two real circuits, Yas Marina in Abu Dhabi and Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve in Montreal, plus seven new World Circuits events. Collector Level, GT7's main progression track, was raised from 50 to 70, and a Data Logger finally let players compare racing lines, throttle and brake inputs in practice modes.
Alongside it came GT7's first paid expansion, the Power Pack, a PS5-only add-on priced at $29.99 with 50 races across 20 categories. It is unlocked from a new pavilion on the game's world map after Menu Book 9.
The updates kept coming into 2026. A March update added three cars and four races. Update 1.69 on April 23, 2026 added three more, including the Yangwang U9, an electric supercar, and a weekly Power Pack Challenges mode. Ahead of the 2026 24 Hours of Le Mans, Polyphony added four Hypercars and a Porsche safety car.
Forza Motorsport: the reboot that stopped
Forza Motorsport took a different approach. Released on October 10, 2023 for Xbox Series X|S and PC, and on Game Pass from day one, it rebooted the series by dropping the number from its title. Turn 10 built it on its ForzaTech engine with real-time ray tracing on track, dynamic time of day, tyre wear and a revised damage model. At launch it offered more than 500 cars and 20 circuits.
Critics were enthusiastic. It scored 84 on Metacritic for Xbox and 83 for PC, and won Best Sports/Racing Game and Innovation in Accessibility at The Game Awards 2023. But players were split. Its Car Points system, which made you level up each car before upgrading it, drew complaints, as did bugs and a smaller track list than earlier games. On Steam, user reviews settled at "mostly negative."
Turn 10 promised monthly cars and events, and for two years it delivered: the game received 22 free updates. Then the studio was hit hard by Microsoft's job cuts in July 2025. On December 16, 2025, Turn 10 said Forza Motorsport would get no more "new cars, tracks, features, or regular bug fixes." Servers stay online, special events continue, and previously released Featured Tours return in rotation, but the game will not grow again. The studio's focus shifted to supporting Playground Games' Forza Horizon 6.
Why the paths split
The difference is not quality on the track. Both games drive beautifully, and both have devoted communities. Both also launched to mixed feelings from players, GT7 over its economy and Forza over its progression. The difference is what each publisher decided to do next.
Sony treated GT7 as a platform. Rather than rush a Gran Turismo 8, Polyphony kept investing in one game, added hardware hooks such as PS VR2, and, by 2025, found a way to charge for a large expansion. That kept players in the same garage instead of resetting their collections.
Microsoft's games business, under pressure through 2025 and 2026, chose fewer, bigger bets. Forza Horizon, the open-world festival racer, is the bigger seller and the bigger brand, and the company concentrated its racing team there. Former Xbox chief Phil Spencer said in October 2025 that the Motorsport series had not ended, only that it was not coming back soon.
By the numbers
- 4.5 years: GT7's age when its latest 2026 updates arrived
- 340 cars that Gran Turismo Sophy 2.0 can drive
- 8 cars and 2 circuits in Spec III
- $29.99: the price of GT7's PS5-only Power Pack
- 500+ cars at Forza Motorsport's launch
- 22 free updates before Forza Motorsport's content ended
What to play next
If you want a console sim that is still growing, Gran Turismo 7 is the obvious pick, and the Power Pack gives veterans a reason to return. Complete newcomers can try the free My First Gran Turismo first to learn braking points and racing lines before paying for the full game. Forza Motorsport is still worth playing for its handling and ray-traced visuals, especially on Game Pass, but treat it as a finished game rather than a living one.
Want real-world racing instead? F1 25's 2026 Season Pack brings this year's Formula 1 rules to the game. And if your idea of racing involves Tokyo streets and a festival wristband, read our Forza Horizon 6 review round-up, the game that Turn 10's team now helps support.