Not yet, at least not at the top end. In its first seven weeks after early access (day 0 to day 48), EA SPORTS FC 27 Ultimate Team released fewer promo cards rated 86 or higher than FC 26 did over the same stretch (115 vs 134). But it released more at 88+ (54 vs 45) and more at 90+ (18 vs 11), and the best promo card in both games is a 92. Add the cards that were already in the game before early access and FC 26 edges the top end instead (21 vs 19 at 90+). Either way, EA cut the lower-rated promo cards, not the top ones. That's consistent with what EA actually promised: its FUT Deep Dive says the gap between base and final campaign items should be "meaningfully smaller" by the end of the season, not in November. The real test starts in late November, when FC 26's curve took off.
We're in Season 2 of EA FC 27 (22 October to 3 December 2026, per EA's Launch Rewards Pitch Notes), Ultimate Scream is winding down and Road to the Knockouts is expected tonight. This week, "power curve" turned into one of the loudest complaints on Reddit. In one r/fut thread, a player argued the "slower curve" is a myth because the average opponent's attack and midfield already sit at 88 to 89. A second thread on r/EASportsFC made the opposite case: everyone has the same team, Evos are useless and promos barely exist unless you pay.
Those two views can both be partly true, so we pulled the numbers.
TLDR: FC 27 power curve in 30 seconds. Promo items 86+ released in the first seven weeks: FC 26 134, FC 27 115 (14% fewer). At 88+: 45 vs 54. At 90+: 11 vs 18. Best promo card: 92 in both. EA's promise: a "meaningfully smaller" gap by the end of the season, PlayStyle+ capped at 3 (was 5), about 5 fewer Campaign Squad weeks. FC 26's curve broke from late November: its 90+ promo count tripled in November after Thunderstruck (released 28 November 2025). Counting cards already in the game before early access: FC 26 21 at 90+, FC 27 19. Our verdict: so far the slower curve means fewer lower-rated promos, not a lower ceiling. Spend coins on cards you'll actually use, and judge the curve after Black Friday, not before.
EA Sports FC 27 - Coins
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What did EA actually promise about the FC 27 power curve?
EA never said promo cards would stop at a certain rating, and it never said the first two months would look different. The exact wording in the FC 27 FUT Deep Dive (2 August 2026) is:
"At launch, Player Items will have similar OVR and PlayStyle levels to FC 26. However, by the end of the season, we are intending for the scope of Attribute and PlayStyle upgrades between base items and final campaign Items to be meaningfully smaller compared to FC 26."
That's a promise about the shape of the whole year. The concrete levers EA listed in the same section:
- PlayStyle+ cap cut from five to three per item.
- Smaller Attribute upgrades across the year, "with a particular focus on preserving the qualities that make each player unique".
- About five fewer weeks with a Campaign Squad across the year.
- Smaller Campaign squads where it suits the theme, and a narrower "range of OVRs and Attributes within each release".
EA's first FUT Developer Notes (1 October) confirmed the squad part was live: "we're taking a more focused approach with smaller squads and a tighter OVR spread than in previous years." The goal, EA said, was to raise the chance that any Campaign item earns a starting XI spot, with "fewer items trading at or near discard."
So the promise has two parts. Fewer, tighter promo releases are happening now. A smaller gap is meant to show up over the full year. The data so far fits that split.
How does the FC 27 power curve compare to FC 26 so far?
We pulled every player item rated 86 or higher from fut.gg's FC 26 and FC 27 databases on 6 November 2026. We dropped Evolution items, base Gold cards, base ICONs, base Heroes and Hall of FUT base items, which left only promo items. Then we counted the ones added between early access (19 September 2025 for FC 26, 18 September 2026 for FC 27) and day 48 after it, which is seven weeks of content.
Day 48 is a clean cut. It's the day before each game's Champions League campaign: FC 26's UCL Primetime landed on 7 November 2025, and FC 27's Road to the Knockouts is expected on 6 November 2026.
| Promo items, day 0 to 48 | FC 26 | FC 27 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rated 86+ | 134 | 115 | -14% |
| Rated 86 | 60 | 39 | -35% |
| Rated 87 | 29 | 22 | -24% |
| Rated 88+ | 45 | 54 | +20% |
| Rated 90+ | 11 | 18 | +64% |
| Rated 91+ | 6 | 9 | +50% |
| Highest promo OVR | 92 | 92 | Same |
| Average of the top 20 | 90.0 | 90.45 | +0.45 |
Three things stand out:
- The cut is at the bottom. FC 27 released 21 fewer 86-rated promo cards than FC 26. EA's 1 October notes tie its "tighter OVR spread" to fewer items trading at or near discard, and this is what that looks like in the card count.
- The top end grew. 89s went from 10 to 17 and 90+ went from 11 to 18. That fits the Reddit complaint that opponents already field 88 to 89 attackers, although card counts can't tell you what any one opponent actually plays.
- The ceiling hasn't moved. Putellas (TOTW) and Mbappé (TOTW) are FC 27's two 92s. FC 26 had Salah, Mbappé (LaLiga POTM) and Putellas at 92 in the same window.
Doesn't Destined for Glory inflate FC 27's count? A little. Destined for Glory items upgrade live through the season, and fut.gg shows their current rating. Haaland and Mbappé's Destined for Glory items both sit at 91 now. Future Stars also have an upgrade path, but EA releases those upgrades on 3 February, so they still show release ratings. Strip Destined for Glory out and FC 27 has 95 promo cards at 86+, 46 at 88+ and 16 at 90+. Strip Future Stars too and it's 75, 37 and 14. Either way, that's more 90+ cards than FC 26's 11.
What about cards released before early access? Our window starts on early-access day, which leaves out FC 26's Champion ICONs (15 cards, three of them 92s) and FC 27's 86-rated Debut International ICONs. Count everything in the game by day 48 and FC 26 leads at the very top: 21 promo items at 90+ against FC 27's 19, and six 92s against two. So FC 27 has released more 90+ cards since early access, but FC 26 had slightly more elite cards available overall. Live-upgrade cards in either game show today's rating, not their release-day rating, so treat this as a snapshot of where the cards stand now.
Where did FC 26's power curve actually break?
This is the part the Reddit argument skips. FC 26's first seven weeks looked almost as tame as FC 27's do now. The curve broke later.
Counting every FC 26 promo item now rated 90+ by the month fut.gg added it. These are final ratings, so cards that upgraded later in the year count at their upgraded OVR:
| FC 26 month | Promo items now 90+ | What landed |
|---|---|---|
| September 2025 | 10 | Champion ICONs (added before early access) |
| October 2025 | 11 | Ultimate Scream |
| November 2025 | 32 | Thunderstruck (EA release 28 Nov), ICONs now listed up to 96 |
| December 2025 | 52 | |
| January 2026 | 98 | TOTY (added 16 Jan), Dembélé now 97 |
| February 2026 | 97 | |
| March 2026 | 166 | |
| April 2026 | 262 | |
| May 2026 | 365 | |
| June 2026 | 374 | Festival of Football: Path to Glory, items later upgraded to 99 |
| July 2026 | 367 | |
| August 2026 | 222 |
By the end of FC 26, fut.gg lists 2,066 promo items rated 90+ and 859 rated 95+. Only 21 of those (about 1%) were added in September and October 2025. Black Friday was the turning point. Every FC 26 promo item in our data now rated above 92 arrived with or after FC 26 Thunderstruck, which EA released on 28 November 2025. Thunderstruck's ICONs are now listed at up to 96.
That's why "the power curve is already broken" and "the power curve is fake" are both early calls. FC 27's opening looks a lot like FC 26's, with fewer lower-rated promo cards. The question EA has to answer is what Black Friday, TOTY and the summer promos look like. A "meaningfully smaller" gap by the end of the year would mean nowhere near 859 cards at 95+.
What is already slower in FC 27 Ultimate Team?
The ceiling isn't lower yet, but several things are measurably tighter:
- PlayStyle+. The max is three per item, down from five. FC 26's endgame campaign cards could carry five. EA's stated reason for the cut is preserving what makes each player unique.
- Evolutions. EA told players on 1 October that it had made "meaningful changes to the tuning of Evolutions." The Season 2 Evos we've tracked land in a narrow band. Free Strings of Fate caps at 82 OVR and only 215 of 6,355 eligible cards reach that cap (fut.gg data, 6 November). Wicked Winger, a 900 Scream Token store Evo, tops out at 85. That's the "dead Evos" complaint in a sentence: these Evos upgrade your 80s, they don't build 90s. Our Evolutions nerf breakdown covers what changed.
- Promo squad size. Fewer 86s and 87s per release means fewer mid-rated promo cards to fill a squad. That's one likely reason so many teams look the same, alongside the meta.
- Base cards. EA kept launch ratings similar to FC 26 on purpose. Base ICONs still top out at 95 (Pelé and Maradona) in both games.
Our 4-3-1-2 meta breakdown explains the gameplay side of the "everyone plays the same team" problem.
EA Sports FC 27 - FUT Champions Boost
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What does a slower power curve mean for your FC 27 coins?
EA said in its 1 October Developer Notes that "coin balances are more than 50% higher than at the same point last year" (our coin balances breakdown has the full context). More coins chasing fewer, tighter promo releases is the setup for how the market behaves.
How we'd play it:
- Buy the cards you'll actually use now. If FC 27 follows FC 26's timing, the next big jump comes around Black Friday, about three weeks away. EA hasn't confirmed that, so think of it as a likely window, not a date. A starter you'll use until then is a reasonable buy. Our cheap players by position guide lists the value picks at each budget.
- Don't hoard for a ceiling jump that hasn't happened. In FC 26, the jump came with Thunderstruck on Black Friday. FC 27 Black Friday is on Friday 27 November. EA hasn't confirmed Thunderstruck or any FC 27 Black Friday promo by name. Our Black Friday guide tracks what's confirmed.
- Watch what EA has confirmed for late November. EA says all Ultimate Scream items get a temporary upgrade for one week from 24 November that will "boost a single face stat to 99 and reward the player with full in-position Chemistry" (EA, Ultimate Scream). Debut International ICONs upgrade to Champion versions by 30 November (EA's buy-page terms). Both are late-November upgrades, right where FC 26's curve turned.
- Sell what you won't use before mid-November. Our market crash timeline covers the hold-or-sell call for the weeks before Black Friday.
Does Road to the Knockouts break the curve tonight? Unlikely, going by the leaks. FC 26's UCL Primetime started at 92 and FC 27's leaked Road to the Knockouts squad tops out at 91 (Dembélé, Bellingham, Pedri). EA hadn't published a Road to the Knockouts article when we checked. Our RTTK guide has the leaked squad and the upgrade path.
Want the 89s now instead of grinding for them? The pros at timesaver.gg can top up your club or clear the grind before Black Friday.
- EA FC 27 Coins: Comfort Trade with paced delivery, for the cards you'll use through Black Friday
- EA FC 27 Evolutions Boost: Season 2 Evolutions cleared for you, so your 80s hit their cap
- EA FC 27 FUT Champions Boost: pro players for your Weekend League against those 88 to 89 squads
- All EA FC 27 services
How did we measure the FC 27 power curve?
So you can check our work:
- Source: fut.gg's public players API for FC 26 and FC 27 (the same data behind its FC 27 players database), sorted by OVR, pulled on 6 November 2026 at about 16:00 UTC. EA's 1 October notes name fut.gg as an authorised community partner site.
- Included: non-Evolution promo items rated 86+.
- Excluded: Evolution items and base cards (Gold, base ICONs, base Heroes, base Hall of FUT).
- Dates: fut.gg's "created" timestamp for each item. That's when the card entered fut.gg's database, which is usually release day. A few cards appear a day or two early, when the database picks them up ahead of release.
- Windows: day 0 to day 48 inclusive (49 calendar days, seven weeks of content): FC 26 from 19 September to 6 November 2025, FC 27 from 18 September to 5 November 2026. Cards that appeared before early access (FC 26's Champion ICONs and first TOTW, FC 27's Debut International ICONs, first TOTW and three Ones to Watch) aren't in either window. We gave the all-in numbers above.
- Ratings: current OVR in both games. FC 27 Destined for Glory items show the upgrades earned so far, and any FC 26 item that could upgrade shows its final end-of-season rating. That's hindsight: it tells you where each card ended up, not when it got there. We showed the FC 27 numbers with and without its live-upgrade campaigns above.
The verdict: is the FC 27 power curve slower?
Slower in volume, roughly even at the top, and not yet slower overall. FC 27's first seven weeks produced 14% fewer promo cards rated 86+ than FC 26's, but more of them are 88 to 92. Count the pre-launch cards too and the top end is close to level (21 vs 19 at 90+). If opponents feel like they're all fielding 88 to 89 attackers, the card supply fits that, though release counts can't show what people actually play. EA's actual promise is about the end of the year, and it hangs on what happens from late November, when FC 26's Thunderstruck release took the top promo cards past 92. Until then, use your coins on cards you'll play with, and judge the power curve after Black Friday, not before.
FAQ
Is the FC 27 power curve slower than FC 26? Not at the top yet. In the first seven weeks, FC 27 released 115 promo cards rated 86+ against FC 26's 134, but more at 90+ (18 vs 11), and the best promo card in both is a 92. Counting cards already in the game before early access, the 90+ totals are close (FC 26 21, FC 27 19). The cut so far is in lower-rated promo cards.
What did EA say about the FC 27 power curve? In the FC 27 FUT Deep Dive, EA said launch items would be similar to FC 26 but the gap between base items and final campaign items would be "meaningfully smaller" by the end of the season. It also cut the PlayStyle+ cap from five to three and planned about five fewer Campaign Squad weeks.
What is the highest rated card in FC 27 right now? The base ICONs Pelé and Maradona at 95, the same as in FC 26. Among promo cards released in the first seven weeks, the highest is 92: Alexia Putellas and Kylian Mbappé, both Team of the Week.
When did the FC 26 power curve take off? From late November 2025. EA released FC 26 Thunderstruck on 28 November, and its ICONs are now listed at up to 96. Promo items now rated 90+ went from 11 added in October to 32 in November, 98 in January (TOTY) and 374 in June.
Should I save FC 27 coins for Black Friday? Only if you have nothing to spend them on now. Last year's big ceiling jump came with Black Friday, but EA hasn't confirmed an FC 27 Black Friday promo by name. Cards you'd use for the next three weeks are a fair buy today.
Why are FC 27 Evolutions weaker? EA retuned them as part of balancing Evolutions against the market, SBCs and rewards. The Season 2 Evos we've tracked cap in the low-to-mid 80s. Free Strings of Fate stops at 82, so they upgrade mid-rated cards rather than build meta 90s.
