Polyphony Digital announced a partnership with the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile in June 2014, permitting FIA-certified content and an online championship in Gran Turismo 6 for 2015 — the earliest official online championship managed by Polyphony Digital and sanctioned by the FIA. In 2016, Polyphony and the FIA announced the formation of the FIA-Certified Gran Turismo Championships (FIA GTC).
The series was established in Gran Turismo Sport following that game’s release, with test seasons running from 2017 to 2018 and the first official season beginning in 2018. The inaugural World Tour at Nürburgring saw Giorgio Mangano of Italy become the first Nations Cup event winner, while Philippe Nicolay, Matthew Thomas, and Anthony Duval, representing BMW, became the first Manufacturer Series event winners. Brazilian racing driver Igor Fraga became the inaugural Nations Cup champion that year, and Kanata Kawakami, Vincent Rigaud, and Tyrell Meadows became the inaugural Manufacturer Series champions. Champions were honoured at the FIA Prize Giving Ceremony.
In 2019, Polyphony Digital and Toyota Gazoo Racing introduced the Toyota GR Supra GT Cup, initially exclusive to the Toyota GR Supra. The series expanded in 2021 to include the rest of Toyota’s lineup and was renamed the Toyota Gazoo Racing GT Cup. It concluded in April 2025.
The format changed in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with all planned live events dropped and the season held entirely online. Italian player Valerio Gallo won the 2021 World Finals and became the final Gran Turismo Sport champion.
The series transitioned to Gran Turismo 7 for the 2022 season. Polyphony’s FIA partnership was simultaneously placed on hiatus, with FIA Director of Innovative Sporting Projects Frederic Bertrand stating they would resume collaboration once Gran Turismo 7 became a sufficiently stable platform. The FIA name was dropped and the tournament was renamed the Gran Turismo World Series. Live events returned in 2022: the Showdown at Hangar-7 in Salzburg, Austria, and the World Finals at Monte-Carlo Sporting in Monte Carlo, Monaco. The inaugural GT7 World Finals concluded in controversy when Mazda’s Manufacturers Cup representatives suffered equipment failures and retired, and Nations Cup champion Coque López won his first title following contact with fellow contender Angel Inostroza in an incident deemed a racing incident.
The tournament has hosted exhibition races since 2019. The Pro-Am race pairs series competitors with personalities including content creators and professional racing drivers; Formula One drivers such as Juan Pablo Montoya have participated, as have game ambassadors Esteban Ocon and Lewis Hamilton. Sony AI also hosts exhibition races in which series drivers race against the AI agent Gran Turismo Sophy, developed in collaboration by Sony AI, Sony Interactive Entertainment, and Polyphony Digital, serving as a testing ground for the AI team to evaluate Sophy’s pace and behaviour.
Five-time champion Takuma Miyazono raced in the first round of the 2025 Nürburgring Langstrecken-Serie in the VT2 production car class with Toyo Tires and Ring Racing. Racing drivers including Brazilian Super Formula driver Igor Fraga and Japanese Super GT driver Rikuto Kobayashi have also competed in the series.
As of 2025, series partners include Brembo, Dunlop Tyres, Mazda, Toyota Gazoo Racing, and Fanatec. Clothing is provided by Puma and peripherals by Fanatec.
Each season begins with a World Tour event featuring top drivers from the prior season; the winner gains direct access to the World Finals. The Online Series then serves as the qualification phase, divided into four stages each containing ten rounds. After each stage, a World Tour event is held for the top players from that stage. Players must sign an application form and be over 18 to participate in World Tour events, and the Online Series typically runs five to seven months.
Live events in the Nations Cup include the top 90 players (30 per region) with the highest aggregate points. Three regional events feed the top 10 players per region into the World Finals. The Manufacturers Cup live events include the top 48 players (three per region) and 16 manufacturers; the World Finals determine the top three players and the champion manufacturer.
The 2020 World Finals were held as an online event due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For 2021 the online season was divided into six races, replacing physical World Tours, with mid-season Showdown playoffs and grand finals aired as tape-delayed streams.
For 2023 the Nations Cup switched to a team-based format, previously used by Polyphony Digital in 2018 at the Hangar-7 World Tour. The online season comprised fourteen races (seven per series) and team lineups were formed from the top three competitors per country in the standings. Live audiences returned in 2023 for the first time since the 2020 Sydney World Tour, with the Showdown held at Theater Amsterdam in the Netherlands.
Players participate through Sport mode in Gran Turismo 7 and are separated into three leagues by in-game driver rating: GT1 League (rating A and above), GT2 League (rating B), and GT3 League (rating C and below). Only GT1 League players are eligible for World Series and World Finals live events.
The Nations Cup and Manufacturers Cup trophies are laser-scanned reproductions of Italian sculptor Umberto Boccioni’s 1913 bronze futurist sculpture Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, chosen by Polyphony Digital as it represents the “surprise and fascination of machines first discovered by mankind” and shares values held by the Gran Turismo series. Players receive a plaque for participation during live events and at year’s end; top-three finishers receive a gold plaque and a trophy. TAG Heuer watches were formerly awarded but were discontinued after the partnership with Polyphony ended in 2020; Sony Alpha photography equipment was given that year, followed by BBS wheels in 2021.
As of 2025, 66 countries across five regions — EMEA, North America, Central and South America, Asia, and Oceania — are eligible for the Nations Cup. Players may choose between 27 manufacturers for the qualification stage, with the 12 highest-scoring manufacturers advancing to the World Tours.
World Series drivers including previous champions Igor Fraga, Mikail Hizal, Takuma Miyazono, Tomoaki Yamanaka, Valerio Gallo, Coque López, and Daniel Solis appear in Gran Turismo 7 as AI opponents and License Test coaches.
As of 2025, there have been eight individual Nations Cup champions and eighteen individual Manufacturers Cup champions, plus five different Manufacturers Cup winning manufacturers. Five individual Toyota GR GT Cup champions were awarded before that series concluded.
Takuma Miyazono is the most successful driver in the Gran Turismo World Series, with five individual championship titles: one Toyota GR GT Cup, two Nations Cup, and two Manufacturers Cup titles. Coque López, Miyazono, and José Serrano hold the most Nations Cup titles with two each; López became the first repeat Nations Cup champion after winning in 2023, the only year the Nations Cup used a team-based format, alongside Serrano and Pol Urra. In the Manufacturers Cup, six drivers — Igor Fraga, Tomoaki Yamanaka, Takuma Miyazono, Daniel Solis, Coque López, and Kanata Kawakami — hold the most individual titles with two each: Fraga and Yamanaka for Toyota, Miyazono and Solis for Subaru, and Kawakami and López for Lexus.
Miyazono is the only driver to have completed a treble in a single year, winning all three series championships in 2020 when the Toyota GR GT Cup was active. From 2018 to 2024, all Manufacturers Cup winners were Japanese manufacturers (Lexus, Toyota, Subaru, and Nissan); Porsche became the first non-Japanese manufacturer to win the title in 2025.
Igor Fraga, Mikail Hizal, Takuma Miyazono, Coque López, and José Serrano hold the distinction of having won both the Nations Cup and Manufacturers Cup in the Gran Turismo World Series.
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