Enjoying this article? Add us as a preferred source on Google.
The PS5 version’s release date, which had been listed as nothing more than “coming 2026,” finally has specifics attached. It didn’t move forward, though — it slid back. Forza Horizon 6 on PS5 now launches January 27, 2027. Preorders opened the same day the date was announced.
A preorder trailer also went up on the PS Store. For anyone who had been waiting on the assumption it would land somewhere before the end of the year, that’s a reset of more than a month.
Still, getting an actual date on the board is progress. Left at “2026,” you’d have been waiting through to December with nothing to go on. Xbox Game Studios is publishing and Playground Games is developing, and neither of those has changed.
This article covers the PS5 version’s release date and preorder situation, plus how the game builds out Japan as its setting. That includes what the delay actually means.
Let’s clear up the thing everyone wants to know first: when the PS5 version actually arrives.
When does the PS5 version of Forza Horizon 6 release?
Forza Horizon 6 arrives on PS5 on January 27, 2027. That’s a delay from the previously stated release window of “2026.”
| Item | Details |
|---|---|
| Title | Forza Horizon 6 |
| PS5 release date | January 27, 2027 |
| Previously | 2026 (month and day undecided) |
| Publisher | Xbox Game Studios |
| Developer | Playground Games |
| Cars included | More than 550 real-world vehicles |
No explanation for the delay has come from the publisher. That said, tightening a window that had been fuzzed out to the nearest year into a hard date reads as a sign the development side now knows where it stands. A January 27 with a real date attached is more credible than coasting into December still saying “2026.”
Where can you preorder the PS5 version?
Preorders for the PS5 version are open on the PS Store. A preorder trailer went up alongside the release date announcement.
Dropping the preorder opening and the release date together sandwiches the delay announcement between pieces of good news. Put uncharitably, you could call it spin, but from the waiting side, finding out when you can buy it and being able to put it in a cart right now in the same breath is simply less hassle.
How is Japan being built out as the setting?
Forza Horizon 6 is set in Japan, and its courses are built around three types of road with distinct personalities: urban, mountain, and country back road.
The examples the publisher has given are specific. Urban means places like Shibuya in Tokyo, mountain means places like the Yuki-no-Otani snow corridor in Toyama Prefecture, and rural roads round it out. Calling out Yuki-no-Otani by name strikes me as a choice made by someone who knows what they’re doing. Getting to drive through that absurd landscape, with walls of snow towering on both sides, is worth the price of admission by itself.
The Horizon series is good at expressing the character of its chosen location through the texture of its roads. It has toured the UK, Australia, and Mexico, and this time it’s Japan. Urban density on the order of Shibuya’s Scramble Crossing, a mountain pass on a prefectural border, and a dead-straight stretch of country road with nothing around it. If you want all three living on a single map, Japan is genuinely the right place for it.
How many cars are in the game?
More than 550 real-world cars are included.
The Horizon series’ car count has climbed with every numbered entry, and 550-plus remains one of this game’s headline figures. With Japan as the setting, how heavily domestic cars are weighted is the obvious question. No breakdown of the roster has been announced.
Personally, with Japan as the setting, what I’m curious about is how classic cars get handled. The cars you actually want to take up a mountain pass are usually not the latest supercars.
How should you take this delay?
To lead with the conclusion: if you’re planning to play on PS5, this isn’t a bad delay. The date got locked in and preorders opened on top of it.
Laid out plainly, the upsides and the sticking points break down like this.
- Upside: the vague “2026” turned into a firm date of January 27, 2027
- Upside: preorders opened on the PS Store at the same time, and a trailer came with them
- Sticking point: the release itself has still slipped backward
- Sticking point: no explanation for the delay has come from the publisher
- Sticking point: pricing and edition lineup weren’t part of this announcement
As someone whose constant companion is a Steam Deck, a shift in the PS5 schedule honestly doesn’t land that hard for me. But for anyone who was waiting on PS5, this changes their holiday plans. January 27 arrives after you’ve cleared out the big year-end releases. Framed that way, it might actually be a convenient slot.
Enjoying this article? Add us as a preferred source on Google.
Is the PS5 version of Forza Horizon 6 worth buying? Final thoughts
If you want to drive Japan’s roads, it’s worth the wait. A delay is a delay, but with a date and preorders both in place, the nature of the waiting changes.
Here’s the confirmed information again. The PS5 version releases January 27, 2027, a delay from the earlier “2026.” Preorders are live on the PS Store, and a preorder trailer has been released. Xbox Game Studios is publishing, Playground Games is developing. Japan is the setting, with courses modeled on urban areas like Shibuya in Tokyo, mountain terrain like the Yuki-no-Otani snow corridor in Toyama Prefecture, and country back roads. More than 550 real-world cars are included.
The sticking points are that no reason for the delay has been given by the publisher, and that pricing and edition lineup weren’t part of this announcement. For those, all we can do is wait for follow-up news.
This reads as delay news, but the substance is forward motion: the date is locked and preorders are open. Being left dangling until December on a vague “sometime in 2026” is worse than having January 27, 2027 carved in stone, which you can actually plan around. The course selection looks promising too, given they named Yuki-no-Otani outright.
Shibuya, a mountain pass, and an empty country road on one map. There’s a real point to setting this in Japan.
Read Next
Nokko Oda
Leave a Reply