In order to try and find you a fair match, the matchmaking algorithm looks at two things: your “Season-high Flags” and your “Team Score”.

Your Season high Flag count is the highest number of Flags you have won this season. This is different from your current Flag count and is displayed as a green Flag icon on the matchmaking screen. We use season-high Flags instead of current Flags to prevent players who have very strong load-outs deliberately losing Flags and matching with weaker Rivals to score easy wins.

Your Team Score is the total value of all the stats on your Components and Drivers added together. 

Using both these metrics in matchmaking ensures that we find you an appropriate opponent:

- You will face a Rival who has progressed through the Series to about the same point that you have.
- Your Rival will have upgraded their Assets and Drivers to about the same point as you have.

If we cannot find you an appropriate match in a reasonable time period, we broaden out the search. This means that we start looking at Rivals who have slightly higher or lower Flags than you.

If a fair match is still not found, we continue to broaden the search. However, at a certain point when the search becomes too wide, we stop looking and give you a bot Rival instead. Bots are exact recordings of other players who played the game recently (name, load-out, etc.) and are deemed a suitable match. We will also make sure that it is using a recording of a player who raced on the same track you are about to play.

We always look for someone who suitably matches your Team Score. So even if we find you a Rival who has many more Flags than you, the strength of your load-outs will still be suitably matched. In terms of what is considered a suitable match, instead of a hard match threshold your matches will gradually change as you progress through the game, leading to more even matchups and a more gradual progression in difficulty. The difference in Team Score between your own and your rival’s will depend on your current Team Score. As your Team Score increases, so will the range of Team Score differences you will see between you and your opponent. If you have a lower Team Score, there will be less variance between your own and your opponent’s Team Score.