How to earn credits faster in Forza Motorsport

Forza Motorsport credits
(Image credit: Microsoft)

So you’re playing Forza Motorsport and need to earn credits fast in order to afford the fastest car in Forza Motorsport. Indeed, it is only cars you’ll be spending credits on, as mods and upgrades use Car Points instead. Fortunately, there are some clever ways to boost credit earning right from the start while still progressing through career mode. So here are our tips for earning credits faster in Forza Motorsport so you can have your pick from the Forza Motorsport car list

1. Pay to win

Sadly the biggest credits bonus comes from being a Forza VIP member, so if you really want the most credits, buying the VIP membership add-on or Premium Add-Ons bundle will give you a 2x boost to base credits, which means credits earned in practice and from your race finishing position are all doubled. 

2. Up the difficulty

Forza Motorsport credits

(Image credit: Microsoft)

Credit payouts are multiplied depending on your difficulty settings, which are accessed by pressing the menu button after selecting a series and car, and there are some easy (and free) gains to be made here. Drivatar difficulty is a tricky one to get right, as the AI racers’ performance varies greatly from race to race. But you definitely don’t need it set right the way down unless you’re a complete beginner. If you’re familiar with racing games, level 5 difficulty will give you a +41% credit bonus without making the races impossible. And if one race in particular is stumping you, there’s no penalty for dialing it down for one event.

The Ruleset bonus on the same menu makes another clear difference. An extra 10% credits for playing on expert may not sound like much, but don’t be put off by the simulated damage, fuel and tyres, full penalty system and lack of Rewind button. The damage only affects you if you crash really hard, and every race can be restarted for free so if you do wreck, just try again. As a result, you shouldn’t miss the rewind feature too much. 

3. Avoid penalties

Forza Motorsport credits

(Image credit: Microsoft)

To avoid picking up penalties, just pay attention to the other cars and try not to hit them (duh). Watching the brake lights of cars further ahead will let you know where your more immediate rivals are going to start slowing, so you brake when they do, rather than braking when you see they do, to avoid rear-ending them. The game checks every incident to see whether you turned towards another car, neglected to brake or gained time from cutting a corner so, as long as you don’t do those things deliberately, more often than not you’ll get away without a penalty, even on Expert. As for fuel and tyres, you won’t have to worry about those in the short career events, so cane the tyres all you like, and if you do reduce fuel loads to save weight, just make sure you have one lap more than the race length and you’ll never run out. What appears to be ‘harder’ is therefore not really an issue, so you may as well take the credits.

4. Practice, practice, practice

Make sure you complete the set quota of practice laps. The credits yield for doing so doesn’t require skill, but it’s comparable to laps of racing, so you may as well do them and get better at driving. For every driver level you go up (and setting personal best sectors in practice helps with this), you earn even more credits - which can be as much as an entire race’s credits haul, so keep improving and cash in at the same time.

5. Start at the back

Forza Motorsport credits

(Image credit: Microsoft)

Finally, start last (24th) if you dare. You should be able to easily get into the top three if you know what you’re doing, as the back end of the pack is usually very slow. You don’t need to win the race to pick up the full bonus, so even if the leader runs away (as it often does), you can still rake in the moolah. Just remember to start higher up if you need to win to take first in the championship. Progression only requires completion, but those gold trophies look far better than merely participating. 

Justin Towell

Justin was a GamesRadar staffer for 10 years but is now a freelancer, musician and videographer. He's big on retro, Sega and racing games (especially retro Sega racing games) and currently also writes for Play Magazine, Traxion.gg, PC Gamer and TopTenReviews, as well as running his own YouTube channel. Having learned to love all platforms equally after Sega left the hardware industry (sniff), his favourite games include Christmas NiGHTS into Dreams, Zelda BotW, Sea of Thieves, Sega Rally Championship and Treasure Island Dizzy.