Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024

1. Summary

The praise in these reviews is about the planet itself. Players fly over their own towns, say the sim looks spectacular when the scenery streams in properly, and real pilots and student pilots describe using it to practise. Career mode comes up in a large share of reviews: earning licences, buying aircraft and running a company is what drew many buyers. Reviewers who mention free flight often call it the part that works.

Bugs are the subject reviewers raise most, and career mode takes the worst of them: missions that spawn the plane inside a building, ATC that stops responding, phantom crashes and penalties that wipe out reputation and credits after long flights. Launch-era reviews add server queues, endless loading screens and a refund window lost to downloads. Players are split on whether the sim has outgrown MSFS 2020 and on how well it runs. Reviews written in 2026 are noticeably more positive than those from the launch months, though this slice only holds launch-era reviews that someone edited later, and some former critics say they flipped their vote after later sim updates.

2. What keeps coming up

What players praise

The world, the scenery and the visualsHigh

Players describe flying over their own house, their hometown or places they have hiked, and the weather, lighting and seasons get credit again and again. "Flying over my hometown is surreal af considering how accurate it is," one wrote, and another put it as "I can literally fly over my house bro." Close to the ground, though, some reviewers say the screenshots oversell it: they report blurry satellite imagery, "melting" autogen buildings, trees growing through runways and outdated maps of their own region. Several say the look depends on their internet speed, with low-resolution terrain when the streaming servers are slow.

Free flight as the dependable modeMedium

Reviews that bring up free flight usually set it against career mode. Players who just pick a plane and an airport often say they hit far fewer problems. "The free fight is amazing. The career... amazing potential, but too many game breaking bugs as of now," one review sums up. Airliner fans flying their own routes, sightseers and VATSIM users often say free flight alone justifies the purchase, while warning anyone who wants career mode to look elsewhere.

How the aircraft fly, and its value for real pilotsMedium

A smaller group of reviewers are real pilots, student pilots or people training for a licence. Some say general aviation handling improved over MSFS 2020, and several use the sim to rehearse procedures, checklists and circuits. "MSFS is close enough to the real thing that I'm constantly in awe of it," wrote one student pilot. Other pilots disagree strongly, pointing to wobbly handling in light wind, unrealistic helicopter physics, inaccurate radio phraseology and airport layouts that would teach bad habits.

Third-party aircraft and add-onsMedium

Add-ons such as Fenix, PMDG, iniBuilds, FlyByWire and GSX come up mostly in positive reviews. Airliner simmers say the add-on scene caught up and is the reason they moved from 2020. Default aircraft are often called shallow or buggy next to payware, some add-ons crash or misbehave, and a couple of reviewers say certain 2020 add-ons had to be bought again.

Smaller install and quicker setup than 2020Low

A small group praises the smaller install and faster first download compared with MSFS 2020, and some like being able to stream or download content selectively. A few complain that data still lands on the C: drive by default.

Where players are split

Is it better than MSFS 2020?High

Comparisons with MSFS 2020 run through a large share of reviews, in both directions. One group says outright that 2024 is an upgrade, that they switched or that they uninstalled 2020 ("I've officially switched from 2020 to 2024"). A group of about the same size tells buyers to stick with or go back to 2020, or calls 2024 a downgrade ("stick with 2020, its better"). The upgrade camp points to visuals, walkarounds, the EFB and flight planner, career mode and, after later updates, performance. The 2020 camp lists missing features such as in-flight saves, a redesigned interface and control system, and bugs they say 2020 did not have. Reviewers who use payware airliners often add that their add-on library decided it for them.

Performance and hardware demandsHigh

Frame rate, stutter and VRAM split reviewers sharply. One side reports smooth flying, sometimes better than 2020, and several credit specific updates: "SU4 doubled my fps," one wrote. The other side reports stutters at large airports, frame drops on approach, VRAM limits and heavy reliance on frame generation even on high-end GPUs ("This game relies heavily on frame generation for playable performance"). Several players recommend community tools such as AutoFPS, or settings tweaks, to get there.

How much the sim improved after launchMedium

A lot of reviews are edit logs that open with launch-day anger and end in a recommendation, with phrases like "much better now" and "come a long way" or a named sim update. "SU4 is the release it should have been," one reviewer wrote. Others edit in the opposite direction, saying a new update broke something that worked or that the same career bugs are still there. Reviews in both directions describe the launch as bad; they differ on whether the current state is good enough.

Career mode's structure, grind and economyMedium

Bugs aside, players are divided on career mode as a design. Some praise it in plain terms ("I just love the career mode, it has got me totally addicted") and trade tips on which first company to buy to make money faster. Others call it a grind or repetitive, or complain about insurance and maintenance costs, missions generated into unsuitable airports, not being able to move aircraft between companies, and heavy certifications that were missing for a long time. Some add that activities such as firefighting or search and rescue sit behind hours of career progress.

VRLow

VR players disagree. Some call it the most immersive way to fly ("Playing in VR is probably the closest I'll get to piloting a real plane"), while others report stutters, crashes, awkward controller interaction and a cockpit cursor that is hard to use.

HelicoptersLow

Some reviewers enjoy the rescue and rotorcraft missions. Real helicopter pilots and rotorcraft fans list missing physics, fuel system bugs and helicopters that are hard to control on a gamepad.

What frustrates players

Bugs across the whole simHigh

Bugs, glitches and broken features come up in more reviews than any other topic, and the same items appear in review after review: autopilot or LNAV switching off, avionics and flight plans that do not sync, throttles or controls that stop responding, fuel bugs, AI aircraft floating or driving through parked planes, passengers clipping through fuselages, jetways and pushback failing, trees and buildings on taxiways. Words like "beta", "alpha", "unfinished" and "not ready" are common. Plenty of positive reviews list bugs too. "When this game works, it's incredible, and a lot of fun. When it doesn't... it's beyond frustrating," wrote one reviewer who did not recommend it.

Career mode bugs that wipe out long flightsHigh

When a bug hits career mode, the player loses progress. Reviewers describe spawning inside hangars or in front of trees, hold-short markers in the wrong place, being penalised for flap overspeed while parked, ATC that will not answer the request a mission needs, missions that never register a landing, and phantom crashes that cost millions in repairs. A smaller group complains about reputation or score penalties for things they did not do. "It will constant doc your reputation and flight score for things you did not even do," one player wrote. Some point out that a flight cannot be saved partway, so a bug near the end of a long flight costs the whole trip: "Grind everything out and have the game take it away with a bug. Repeat."

Loading, servers and the streaming modelHigh

Complaints about loading screens, queues, servers, bandwidth warnings and streaming are concentrated at launch and thin out a lot in reviews written in 2026. Players describe hours in login queues, loading stuck at 97%, 68% or 0%, and "low bandwidth" warnings on gigabit connections. "Streaming all assets was a terrible design decision," one reviewer wrote, and another called it "the world's most expensive loading screen." Later reviews praise the option to download content locally, but players in rural areas or on slow connections still say the sim is unusable for them.

Price, editions and the marketplaceMedium

Price complaints center on paying full or premium-edition prices for a sim reviewers call unfinished, on deluxe and aviator aircraft that could not be used in career mode or were buggy, and on individual payware aircraft that add up fast. "No game is worth $200... they aren't even worth $70," wrote one player who has flown Flight Simulator since the DOS days and still recommends it. Several reviewers advise buying the standard edition or waiting for a sale, and some liked the bigger editions.

ATC and AI voicesMedium

ATC complaints include wrong altitudes, ignored requests, runways crossed without warning and career penalties caused by ATC errors. The AI-generated voices for passengers and controllers are called robotic and repetitive, and some reviewers turn character voices off entirely. One review complained that "every character has an awful AI voice," and another asked for the ATC and passenger audio to be split so pilots can keep the radio.

Controls setup and the interfaceMedium

Players with yokes, HOTAS and Thrustmaster Airbus sets describe hours binding controls per aircraft, bindings that vanish between flights, no axis display and default profiles that did not work. "Coming from 2020, setting up the various controllers is horrific," one reviewer wrote. The menus are called slow, console-like and confusing, and mouse-and-keyboard newcomers add that the tutorials do not explain enough.

Refunds lost to downloads and loadingMedium

Refund complaints often come from people who say the first download, sign-in or loading used up their two hours before they ever flew. "They count the download as play time so no chance for a refund either," one wrote. The two-hour limit is Steam's rule, but these players count it against the purchase.

Crashes to desktopMedium

Reviewers describe crashes to desktop, WASM crashes and freezes, often on approach or after hours in the air. With no way to save mid-flight, a crash late in a long career flight is where some reviewers say they gave up.

Xbox and Microsoft account sign-inLow

Sign-in problems include input fields that will not accept text, endless "waiting for authentication", locked or permanently linked accounts, and controller-only setups that cannot type an email. Some of these players say they never got to fly.

3. The player conversation

The conversation is long, angry and full of edits. Many reviews are running diaries with dated updates, and many of those dated to launch week were rewritten later, some flipping to a recommendation and some sinking further. Positive reviews are often hedged: "when it works" and "still buggy" turn up on both sides, and a clear line runs between players who stay in free flight and players who bought the sim for career mode.

Reviews written after only a couple of hours lean toward first-launch problems: sign-in, loading, downloads and the lost refund window. Refund complaints are far more common in reviews from players under two hours than from players past 50 hours. Players with dozens or hundreds of hours talk about career penalties, ATC, aircraft systems and add-ons, problems that only show up after a lot of flying. Real pilots and long-time simmers bring most of the realism critiques and the comparisons with MSFS 2020 and X-Plane.

Within this slice, reviews written later are more positive: 52.5% of those written from December 2024 to June 2025 recommend the game, against 77.7% of those written in 2026. Because the slice was chosen by last update, launch-era reviews appear only if someone edited them later, so these figures describe the reviews in this set rather than a measured trend. Loading and server complaints thin out in the later reviews, which often credit named sim updates. Career bug reports drop less and still turn up in 2026 reviews.

4. What the developers could do

1. Stop career mode from punishing players for its own bugs. Career players describe lost reputation, credits or aircraft after spawns inside buildings, misplaced hold-short markers, phantom crashes and unresponsive ATC, so detecting these cases and refunding the losses would remove the penalty they resent.
2. Add in-flight saves or crash recovery for long flights. Some reviewers describe losing flights of several hours to a crash or error near the end, with no way to resume.
3. Keep reducing crashes to desktop and WASM crashes. Crashes on approach, at menu transitions and with complex aircraft are a reason some players quit or go back to MSFS 2020.
4. Rebuild the controls setup. Players with yokes, HOTAS and throttle quadrants ask for working default profiles, import of their 2020 bindings, an axis display, global profiles and bindings that do not vanish between flights.
5. Make first launch fast and finishable inside the refund window. Login loops, loading stuck at fixed percentages and long first downloads cost new players their refund window before they fly, so pre-downloading core content and fixing the sign-in flow would let them reach the cockpit first.
6. Fix ATC logic and give players control over AI voices. Reviewers want correct ATC instructions in career mode, the automatic ATC response option there, and separate volume channels so passenger chatter does not drown out the radio.
7. Be clear about which edition aircraft work in career mode, and finish the missing certifications. Buyers of deluxe and premium editions felt misled when their aircraft were not career-ready and heavy certifications were absent.