Ahead of iRacing's 2025 Season 2 starting next week, the development team have released videos talking about a major new feature and a heavily anticipated change that will feature in the next build.
We are now in Week 12 of iRacing's first of four seasons this year, meaning one more week of official racing before a break week, with Season 2 starting on March 18th. A lot of the content getting added has already been confirmed, such as Portland International Raceway and the new ARCA series cars.
Beyond content additions, there are a slew of other features and quality-of-life additions coming to iRacing. All of these were detailed in our article covering the February development update blog, but the development team have gone a step further in showcasing the upcoming Adaptive AI and GTP/P2 tyre physics rework.
iRacing stated that they would be reworking the tyre model to bring it in line with reality, and it will be released ahead of Season 2. As shown in the video, out laps will be very precarious, and it will be worth attempting a lot of practice to gently bring the tyres into their operating window.
For the endurance series races featuring these cars, a lot of people may be used to the prototype drivers going for ridiculously overzealous divebombs on GT3s. But with this change, fresh tyres on an out-lap can result in the GT3s having the same corner speeds as the Prototypes, so it may be very tempting to get some payback. As tempting as it may be, perhaps it would be a bad idea, and instead, it will just be worth filing a protest instead.
Whilst this is a welcome change - as will the changes to the hybrid system, which is expected for Season 3 - there is another new feature that will be very welcomed by the single-player-only crowd.
iRacing will be doing the same, with a new option when setting up an AI single-player race to have Adaptive AI opponents. This means that instead of opponent drivers having a fixed skill level throughout the race - which could be dramatically different to the player and differ across multiple tracks - they will change on the fly to roughly match the player's own lap times.
Adaptive AI is a feature that has been available in RaceRoom for a while now. iRacing has already gone on record stating that they are working on adding a career mode, and the Adaptive AI feature is another step closer to making that a reality.
There are some more changes coming for some of the series within the 'officials' tab that we will quickly go over.
The M2 will take over from next season in that series from the new M4 GT4 and also from the old M4 GT4 in the Production Car Challenge. It had also been previously confirmed to be replacing the Toyota GR86 in the Nürburgring Endurance Championship and the 24-hour Special Event in June.
The BMW M2 CSR will be available in more series.
For those who enjoy F4, it may not have escaped your notice that after previously running them every other hour, the open and fixed setup F4 Challenge series were scheduled to run at the same time during Season 1, which resulted in participation in the open setup series tanking. As a result, the F4 Challenge open will be discontinued, with the Challenge fixed, as well as the three regional series remaining.
All rookie series for Oval, Formula Car and Sports Car will now have races scheduled every 15 minutes. Class D level series like Draft Master, Ferrari GT3 Challenge, Toyota GR Cup and all the F4 series will run every half an hour. Then, a load of series that used to run every two hours will now be scheduled hourly, like NASCAR Gen 4 Cup Series, IndyCar Oval Series, Ring Meister and NASCAR 1987 Legends Cup.
To find out more about changes to the frequency of series, read the iRacing Forums post.
EDIT: 05/03/2025
In another video that iRacing released, they revealed their heavily revamped user interface. It will allow for players to figure out which timeslots have the highest number of signups and the strongest strength of field through the Series Insights tab.
Which of these changes arriving in iRacing 2025 Season 2 are you most looking forward to? Let us know in the comments below, and join the discussion in our iRacing forum!
We are now in Week 12 of iRacing's first of four seasons this year, meaning one more week of official racing before a break week, with Season 2 starting on March 18th. A lot of the content getting added has already been confirmed, such as Portland International Raceway and the new ARCA series cars.
Beyond content additions, there are a slew of other features and quality-of-life additions coming to iRacing. All of these were detailed in our article covering the February development update blog, but the development team have gone a step further in showcasing the upcoming Adaptive AI and GTP/P2 tyre physics rework.
iRacing GTP/P2 Tyres
When the 2025 Season 1 build was released, iRacing were met with heavy criticism for the GTP/Hypercar cars - including the new Ferrari 499P - and the Dallara LMP2 car's tyre performance and behaviour being dramatically different to how it is in reality. Some top-level iRacing drivers were able to extract a lap time around Le Mans in the Ferrari only a second slower than the all-time pole lap record.iRacing stated that they would be reworking the tyre model to bring it in line with reality, and it will be released ahead of Season 2. As shown in the video, out laps will be very precarious, and it will be worth attempting a lot of practice to gently bring the tyres into their operating window.
For the endurance series races featuring these cars, a lot of people may be used to the prototype drivers going for ridiculously overzealous divebombs on GT3s. But with this change, fresh tyres on an out-lap can result in the GT3s having the same corner speeds as the Prototypes, so it may be very tempting to get some payback. As tempting as it may be, perhaps it would be a bad idea, and instead, it will just be worth filing a protest instead.
Whilst this is a welcome change - as will the changes to the hybrid system, which is expected for Season 3 - there is another new feature that will be very welcomed by the single-player-only crowd.
Adaptive AI
Having opponents on track in a single-player race can range not just per platform but per track, with a lot of experiences varying quite dramatically, which can be an inconvenience to those who do not want to race with other people online. But more and more, development studios have been working on a new type of AI that adjusts its skill level on the fly.iRacing will be doing the same, with a new option when setting up an AI single-player race to have Adaptive AI opponents. This means that instead of opponent drivers having a fixed skill level throughout the race - which could be dramatically different to the player and differ across multiple tracks - they will change on the fly to roughly match the player's own lap times.
Adaptive AI is a feature that has been available in RaceRoom for a while now. iRacing has already gone on record stating that they are working on adding a career mode, and the Adaptive AI feature is another step closer to making that a reality.
There are some more changes coming for some of the series within the 'officials' tab that we will quickly go over.
iRacing 25S2: Official Race Changes
The BMW M2 CS Racing debuted in 2025 Season 1, and up until now, it has exclusively been raced in the Rookies series, but for Season 2, it will be available in a few more series. Firstly is the BMW M Power Challenge at Class D, for two seasons it featured a range of BMW cars and then just the recently added BMW M4 GT4 G82.The M2 will take over from next season in that series from the new M4 GT4 and also from the old M4 GT4 in the Production Car Challenge. It had also been previously confirmed to be replacing the Toyota GR86 in the Nürburgring Endurance Championship and the 24-hour Special Event in June.
The BMW M2 CSR will be available in more series.
For those who enjoy F4, it may not have escaped your notice that after previously running them every other hour, the open and fixed setup F4 Challenge series were scheduled to run at the same time during Season 1, which resulted in participation in the open setup series tanking. As a result, the F4 Challenge open will be discontinued, with the Challenge fixed, as well as the three regional series remaining.
All rookie series for Oval, Formula Car and Sports Car will now have races scheduled every 15 minutes. Class D level series like Draft Master, Ferrari GT3 Challenge, Toyota GR Cup and all the F4 series will run every half an hour. Then, a load of series that used to run every two hours will now be scheduled hourly, like NASCAR Gen 4 Cup Series, IndyCar Oval Series, Ring Meister and NASCAR 1987 Legends Cup.
To find out more about changes to the frequency of series, read the iRacing Forums post.
EDIT: 05/03/2025
In another video that iRacing released, they revealed their heavily revamped user interface. It will allow for players to figure out which timeslots have the highest number of signups and the strongest strength of field through the Series Insights tab.
Which of these changes arriving in iRacing 2025 Season 2 are you most looking forward to? Let us know in the comments below, and join the discussion in our iRacing forum!
