
Fanatec Offering Free Delivery and Shipping As Standard
Buying sim racing hardware directly from brands has always presented a small problem, and that is… Read More »Fanatec Offering Free Delivery and Shipping As Standard
iRacing » How To Race Single-Player in iRacing: AI Racing
iRacing has a complete single-player game mode where you can race against AI opponents in a full race session or a custom single-player championship. Here is everything you need to know.
Disclaimer: Some of the links on this page may be affiliate links. We earn a commission from any sale after clicking an affiliate link. Find out more.
Yes, there is a complete single-player game mode in iRacing. Since 2019, you have been able to race against AI opponents in a full race weekend, including practice, qualifying and warmup sessions. You can also create custom single-player championships to race against a full AI grid through an entire championship.
For years, iRacing has become one of the most popular online sim racing platforms around. However, it has been restricted to online only since it launched in 2008. The only time you have been able to race offline was during server maintenance. And even that didn’t include any AI drivers.
However, in late 2019, the developers included a brand new single-player AI racing game mode. This allowed you to race against a field of AI drivers in a single-player-only experience.
At the time of launch, this only included a single car, the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup (991), but it gave us a way to practice against AI drivers without worrying about our iRating or safety rating.
Since the launch of AI racing in 2019, the developers have been adding more content to the single-player game mode. Now there are well over 45 cars to choose from, and the track list consists of over 80 tracks.
There are a large number of cars and tracks included in the AI racing single-player game mode in iRacing. However, these mainly consist of road and oval racing. Currently, there is no dirt racing at all including the lack of rallycross.
To jump into iRacing AI, you can launch your iRacing UI as normal. From there, click AI Racing on the left-hand side. This will launch the AI Racing dashboard.
From there, to set up a single race using the iRacing AI, you can click the “Single Race” button on the right-hand side. This will launch the single race creation menu where you can configure your race, including AI skill, number of opponents, tracks etc.
In this menu, you can choose which events will be in your custom single-player race. You can include all of the event types that you normally would in iRacing, including practice, qualifying, warmup and race. Then you can dictate how long each session is to create a completely custom AI race.
You have a total of nine menus to adjust your custom race. The first is the track you wish to race on, and the second is the weather. You can manually control the weather or let iRacing control this for you.
Next up is race options, where you can choose items such as turning damage on. Then you move on to choosing the car that you wish to race in, followed by the AI cars. You can choose a saved roster of cars which you have pre-configured, or you can manually control the roster for this individual race. You can choose the number of competitors and their skill level.
To change the AI difficulty in AI racing, you can set a skill range. This will set the overall skill of the entire AI field, with some drivers racing at the lower skill level through to the highest. This skill slider is a range between 0-100%. The closer to 100% you go, the faster the AI will be. You can even turn on the “Avoid Me” toggle to tell the AI to avoid making contact with you.
Then you move on to setting the track conditions and time of day. You can leave these to be dynamic to allow for the build-up of grip levels and for time to progress at your desired speed.
From there, simply launch the session and you will jump into your AI race event. All of the controls in an AI session remain the same as they do when racing online. The only addition is that you can choose to skip or restart sessions.
Setting up a single-player championship in iRacing is much like creating a single race event. Start by clicking the “Create a Season” button in the main UI which will take you through a similar set-up process to creating a single race.
You will be taken through almost the exact same set-up process, but instead of adding just a single track, you can add multiple tracks in an order of your choosing. The sessions for each track can be individually configured if you fancy creating unique events.
The only real difference in the set-up process is that you have an additional option to configure your championship point distribution. This can follow a variety of real-world point systems or you can create your own points system.
Once, all of the tabs have been scrolled through and configured, you can save your AI season. Then when you’re ready to participate in the first race, you can jump in and click the race button!
AI hosted sessions in iRacing serve as a hybrid between normal online racing and single-player AI racing. You can create a hosted session much as you would normally, and invite a variety of people to participate. However, AI hosted sessions allow you to add AI drivers to your race session.
This gives you the opportunity to race with friends, but also against a full grid of AI-controlled racers. You can set up larger races, much quicker using AI hosted sessions, allowing for fun multi-car racing while still enjoying iRacing with friends.
To do this, simply set up a normal hosted session. Allow for iRacers to register and join your session. And then just before the registration time ends, you can choose to fill the remaining spots with AI drivers. It’s important that all human iRacers join before adding AI drivers, as the AI drivers can fill up spots meant for human participants.
Racing in any of the AI single-player game modes doesn’t affect your safety rating or your iRating. You can use this to your advantage by practising with certain cars and on tracks that you are due to race on in your online series. There are no consequences to going off track or making contact with other AI drivers.
To access the single-player iRacing AI racing you will need an active iRacing subscription. Single-player in iRacing isn’t free. You will also still be required to purchase the cars and tracks that you want to drive.
You can, however, set the AI to control cars that you don’t own. This makes racing a series such as GT3 more interesting. You can drive the car that you own and create a roster of AI cars that are a mixture of different cars.
View our guide on how to start iRacing on a budget.
The good part of the relatively new AI racing mode in iRacing is that you can race it offline. Even when the iRacing servers are down for maintenance, you can access the single-player game mode from the iRacing dashboard.
This allows you to practice your favourite track, or continue your AI season even while you can’t race online. If you want to test new content that you don’t currently own, you can make use of the iRacing test drive servers during server maintenance. Read our guide on how to test drive cars in iRacing.
iRacing doesn’t have a single-player career mode, however, you can create custom championships. The AI championships in iRacing let you configure a championship to your exact requirements. You can dictate how many races there are, the length of sessions and the quality and number of your AI opponents.
This lets you simulate a real championship, giving you real stakes to race for.
In iRacing’s single-player AI game modes, not all content is available. Certain cars and racing disciplines such as Rallycross aren’t currently in single-player iRacing.
Below is a complete list of every car you can race and every car that can be controlled by the AI in single-player.
Below is a list of all tracks that can be raced in single-player iRacing.
iRacing often runs promotional codes giving reduced price memberships. These normally apply to new members only, but sometimes you can pick up a renewal code, so it’s always worth checking.
Read our iRacing promo code guide for a full list of working 2023 iRacing codes.
You can use the links below to shop for your favourite sim racing products, or for any products that we may have recommended. These links are affiliate links, and will earn us a small commission, with no additional cost for you.
Rich is the founder, F1 car setup creator and content writer for SimRacingSetups. With over a decade of experience as a graphic designer, marketing director, competitive sim racer and avid motorsport fan, Rich founded SimRacingSetup.com to share his passion and knowledge of sim racing and Formula 1 with other sim racers. Regularly writes for sim racing website SimRaceReviews.com
View all articles written by RichFind the latest sim racing car setups to always have the advantage on track, with the best ACC car setups, iRacing setups and F1 24 setups.
Assetto Corsa Competizione Setups iRacing Setups AMS2 Setups F1 24 SetupsView the latest deals and discounts for all sim racing brands, including our exclusive discount codes.
View All Sim Racing Discounts MOZA Racing Discounts Fanatec DiscountsBuying sim racing hardware directly from brands has always presented a small problem, and that is… Read More »Fanatec Offering Free Delivery and Shipping As Standard
SIMAGIC is one of the more popular sim racing brands, thanks to its excellent hardware quality… Read More »Which Games Can You Play With SIMAGIC Racing Wheels?
Asetek is a sim racing brand that has risen from a CPU cooling brand into one… Read More »Which Games Can You Play With Asetek Racing Wheels?
Cookie | Duration | Description |
---|---|---|
cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics | 11 months | This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional | 11 months | The cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary | 11 months | This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary". |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others | 11 months | This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other. |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance | 11 months | This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance". |
viewed_cookie_policy | 11 months | The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data. |