Forza Horizon 6 pulls in over 270,000 Steam players at launch, and the number is still climbing as Playground’s racer picks up momentum

Forza Horizon 6 just released today, May 19, 2026, for players who purchased the base game or have Xbox Game Pass Ultimate, following a five-day early access period for Premium Edition owners.

Forza Horizon 6 also marks the series’ first time in the long-requested Japan setting, giving players the opportunity to explore an open-world version of Japan with a huge variety of cars, though not my favorite car, which is the 1967 Chevrolet Impala.

During that early access period, the game managed to hit over 170,000 concurrent players on Steam, marking an impressive start for Playground Games' latest entry.

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Now, though, with the game officially available to everyone, we’re seeing even more impressive numbers, sitting at just over 270,000 at the time of writing, but I suspect that will go up as more people come online or over the weekend. It's also worth mentioning that I believe this is the highest peak ever for a racing game on Steam, which is also just as impressive.

Compared to previous games, Forza Horizon 5 peaked at around 80,000 concurrent players on Steam. and Forza Horizon 4, which peaked at around 75,000.

It’s nice to see PlayGround Games perform so well here, we also know it’s the biggest early access launch in the series history thanks to a tweet on X (formerly Twitter) by now Xbox CEO, Asha Sharma.

The game has also been received extremely well by critics, landing a 91 on Metacritic among reviewers, which I touched on in a review round-up I did when the review embargo lifted a few days ago.

I’ve actually managed to give Forza Horizon 6 a go myself, so I can definitely understand the hype behind the game and why so many people are jumping in to play it. Having not touched the series since, I believe, the Xbox 360 era, it’s been fun just driving around and exploring, something I’m sure plenty of other players are enjoying too.

And if you are having fun exploring Forza Horizon 6, let me know, or perhaps let me know if you aren’t. Either way, I always enjoy hearing what people have to say, so be sure to take part in our poll and leave a comment telling me what you do or don’t like about Forza Horizon 6.

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