This is a crucial setting that’s been on the official F1 games for years now for online play and eSports.  When you set the cars to “Equal Performance” as opposed to “Realistic Performance”, it’s meant to mean that all cars perform equally in an online lobby, regardless of the team, engine etc.

Real life performance is meant to be equalised, so that all cars should theoretically be able to produce exactly the same minimum lap times. Yes, the handling of some cars may suit some players better than others, and they may deliver their lap times in slightly different ways (some cars might have better traction, others better cornering etc). But their overall core pace should be identical when the “Equal Performance” setting is turned on.

But does this actually hold true on F1 23? Does the “Equal cars” setting actually make the cars equal? The answer to this has actually changed a few times already in the short life span of F1 23, so let’s give a summary answer:

As of October 1 2023, the “Equal Performance” setting still did not deliver exactly equal car performance on F1 23. A new 1.14 update that dropped on September 26th partially fixed the issue, but subtle differences still remain in the way different cars react over kerbs.

When this setting was broken, cars were not equal under the “equal” settings, but instead resembled something approaching the real life car performance for each team/car. The “Equal Performance” setting was bugged on the game release of F1 23, fixed in a patch, but has now been broken again by the 1.12 update.

In other words, this new update has broken the game again, and we’re back to where we started with this problem, and the equal performance setting actually delivers realistic performance in online lobbies!

Update – A new 1.14 update has just dropped on September 26th that is meant to fix these issues. Be sure to update your F1 23 game if you haven’t done already, but it still hasn’t totally fixed the issue (more below).

Chronology Of Events With The “Equal Cars” Setting

Readers just want the bottom line latest answer on this, which we’ll give in the section just below, so I’ll just give a quick chronological run-down of what’s happened so far on this game with this setting:

• Game launch – The “Equal Performance” setting was already not quite working properly on game launch, with different cars having different tyre wear in particular when tested in online mode (see this video for a good overview of this, plus Alex Gillon does some good work on this).
• After 1.07 patch – This update dropped in July 2023 and fixed the equal cars tyre wear issue. So this setting was working fine after that.
• After 1.12 Patch (September 2023) – Has broken the equal cars setting again. Cars seem to deliver relative performance more akin to realistic (real life performance) even when on Equal Performance setting, after this update. Needs fixing urgently for online play (incidentally, controller/calibration settings have also been broken with this patch – see here for more on this).
• 1.14 Patch – Dropped on 26th September to fix this issue. Seems to have resolved the straight line speed differences, but not totally equalized the cars still.
• October 1 – After further testing, some minor differences still remain between the cars on the “Equal” setting, with the way different cars handle and react over kerbs still giving some cars a slight advantage.

October 1 Update – Equal Cars Still Not Totally Equal

See the excellent video below which delves deeper into where we stand after the latest 1.14 patch regarding Equal Cars and “Equal Performance”. Bottom line – it’s been partially fixed, but not totally

Main summary points from video:

• 1.14 update does seem to have resolved straight line speed and cornering differences between cars on the Equal setting.
• However, further testing has revealed there are still subtle, minor differences between the way different cars handle over bumps/kerbs, even when on the Equal setting.
• For example, the McLaren seems to handle slightly easier over kerbs, and the Williams seems to be a bit harder to handle over the kerbs (tested using the exact same setups/settings). Alpine also reported by some to not be the best over the kerbs.
• Basically seems easier to be more consistent and get up to pace in certain cars than handle better over kerbs, and harder to do so in other cars like the Williams.
• For causal and lower level leagues, might not make a huge difference, but for top level competitions like eSports, where the skill/performance gap is miniscule anyway, could still make a massive difference (half a tenth of lap time is huge in eSports

September 2023 Update – 1.12 Patch Has Broken “Equal Cars” Setting Again

The 1.12 update for F1 23 dropped in late September 2023. There’s nothing in the patch notes that addresses the Equal Performance Setting, yet it seems to have inadvertently knocked this setting offline and converted it into the Realistic Performance settings.

Which basically means that even if you set Equal Performance for cars in online lobbies, the cars won’t perform equally, and some cars will be capable of faster lap times than others. See the video below where this is tested and demonstrated post 1.12 update.

Initial Video – 1.12 Patch Has Broken “Equal Cars” Setting – Tested

Here’s a quick summary

• Time Trial and Grand Prix mode seem unaffected – Equal Cars still delivers Equal Performance.
• Online GP mode is where the Equal Performance setting seems to now be broken after 1.12.
• Different cars definitely now do not perform equally in online lobbies, even when Equal Performance is turned on.
• It mainly seems to be the straight line speed that varies between different cars now, even when set to Equal, though cornering speed also differs between cars.

Performance seems to have been reverted to roughly the hierarchy of real life performance by team – the Red Bull is fastest, Mercedes and Ferrari close behind, and all the other cars are progressively slower right down to cars like the Williams and Alpha Tauri, which was well over a second slower than the Red Bull using the same setup, conditions, track etc, in the test video above.

It goes without saying, this is unworkable for most online lobbies/leagues, where Equal car performance is needed to make everything fair.

What Happens Now?

With the official eSports competition just a few weeks away at the time of writing, this isn’t a good look for EA/Codemasters. In it’s current form, the game will basically be unusable for high level eSports if the cars don’t actually perform equally when on the equal cars setting is turned on.

Most serious and semi serious online F1 leagues will also probably have to suspend their seasons until this problem is fixed again. Except for the small number of handicap leagues that might exist, almost all leagues expect and need equal car performance to make it a level playing field regardless of what car someone uses.

Tip – League owners can try running the F1 World generic stock multiplayer car instead – this doesn’t seem to be affected.

So presumably, we’ll be getting another patch soon to fix the problems that the 1.12 patch caused in knocking the equal cars setting off and delivering more realistic performance. Being up against a tight deadline for eSports, they’ll presumably be working on it right now, and another patch will be released probably sometime late September or early October, hopefully fixing it ready for the start of eSports.

Update – Patch did drop (1.14), but still not totally fixed the issue. That’s where we’re at up to now.