Copyright Polygon
It's been a long wait, but the Football Manager 26 beta is right around the corner. Known officially as the "advanced access beta", the minor change in terminology comes alongside a complete revamp to the game as it upgrades to the Unity engine. With the Football Manager 26 release date and time coming later this week, we've got the lowdown on exactly when you can get stuck into the soccer simulator ahead of its full release on Tuesday, Nov. 4. The Football Manager 26 beta releases on Thursday, Oct. 23, according to the official Football Manager X account. To play in the beta, you'll need to pre-purchase the game through Steam or an approved third-party retailer; however, it is only available on PC. If you're looking to play Football Manager 26 on another platform, you'll need to wait for the full release date. The specific release time has not been confirmed for the beta. However, Sports Interactive has revealed it will "go live in the evening, UK time." Previous Football Manager betas have typically gone live at or around 5 p.m. BST, so that would be a safe bet to prepare for. Here's how that translates to your time zone: 9 a.m. PDT for the west coast of North America 12 p.m. EDT for the east coast of North America 1 p.m. BRT for Brazil 5 p.m. BST for the United Kingdom 6 p.m. CEST for western Europe 7 p.m. EEST for eastern Europe 1 a.m. JST on Friday, Oct. 24 for Japan 3 a.m. AEDT on Friday, Oct. 24 for the east coast of Australia If the announced release time turns out to be different, we will update this post with the confirmed time. Unfortunately, you cannot preload the beta. As soon as the advanced access window unlocks, you'll be able to download it. Thankfully, Football Manager games are rarely very big in terms of file size, so it shouldn't take too long to get stuck in.
