Need For Speed games in order: By release date

ACING video game franchise Need For Speed has been loved by many since the mid 90s.  

Based around illicit street racing and competitive racing tasks – here’s everything you need to know about Need For Speed.

Need for Speed games in order

First released in the mid 90s, Need For Speed games quickly became one of the most popular racing games of all time.

The legendary action-driving games allow competitive gamers to hit the gas and tear up the roads – and with games released almost every one or two years, gamers have a number of high-speed options to choose from.

To date there are over 20 different games – and we have everything you need to know about the order they were released.

• The Need for Speed (1994)
• Need For Speed 2 (1997)
• Need For Speed 3: Hot Pursuit (1998)
• Need For Speed: High Stakes (1999)
• Need For Speed: Porsche Unreleased (2000)
• Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 (2002)
• Need For Speed: Underground (2003)
• Need For Speed: Underground 2 (2004)
• Need For Speed: Most Wanted (2005)
• Need For Speed: Carbon (2006)
• Need For Speed: ProStreet (2007)
• Need For Speed: Undercover (2008)
• Need For Speed: Shift (2009)
• Need For Speed: Nitro (2009)
• Need For Speed: World (2010)
• Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit (2010)
• Need For Speed Shift 2: Unleashed (2011)
• Need For Speed: The Run (2011)
• Need For Speed; Most Wanted (2012)
• Need For Speed: Rivals (2013)
• Need For Speed: No limits (2015)
• Need For Speed (2015)
• Need For Speed Payback (2017)
• Need For Speed Heat (2019)

What other Need for Speed games are there?

Alongside the 24 primary games, there are nine other Need for Speed games.

But they are not classed as primary instalments.

In 1997 and 1999, Need For Speed: V-Rally and Need For Speed: V-Rally 2 were released by Infogrames Multimedia, but neither had any real connection to the original Need For Speed franchise.

In the late 90s, EA Canada partnered with Paradigm to create Need For Speed 64 – however the game was later cancelled after EA signed a deal with Volkswagen to create a game based on the new Beetle car.

In 2001, an online version of Need For Speed 3: Hot Pursuit was made available known as Need For Speed: Web Racing.

In the same year Motor City Online was released – this game was originally conceived as part of the Need for Speed series; however, it later was discarded in favour of an online-only model.

Just a year later the franchise released Need For Speed: Top Speed – again, this was an online-only game, designed to promote both MacGillivray Freeman’s 2002 IMAX film Top Speed and the then-new Porsche Cayenne Turbo.

Joining the list of Need For Speed games that were cancelled is Need For Speed 10: TerrorFive – the concept for this game was pitched in 2008, but never made it in the series.

Need For Speed: Millionaire is also on the list of cancelled games – the online-only entry was worked on for six months, before being discarded in favour of Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit.

The final entry of other Need For Speed games is Need For Speed: Edge – this free to play racing game was released in 2017, but just two years later was shut down by Nexon.