Best FPL Apps 2025/26

FPL 2025/26: what changed

The 2025/26 season is the most complex FPL has ever been, and the tooling landscape has had to keep pace. Two rule changes in particular have reshaped which apps are worth using and why.

The first is Defensive Contributions (DEFCON) — a new points system that awards two points to outfield players who register 10 or more clearances, blocks, interceptions, and tackles in a match (12 or more for midfielders and attackers). This has made tracking bonus and DEFCON changes in real time during matches genuinely important. The official FPL app is too slow to be useful here; dedicated trackers like FPL Focal now fill that gap.

The second is two sets of chips. Every manager now receives two of each chip — Wildcard, Free Hit, Triple Captain, and Bench Boost — with the first set to be used before the Gameweek 19 deadline and the second available from that point onwards. The second set became available in mid-February 2026. This has made multi-GW planning significantly more complex and elevated the value of tools like fpl.team and FPL Review's chip strategy analyser.

One thing that did not survive: the Assistant Manager chip, trialled in 2024/25, was scrapped for this season. And for managers who relied on FBref for advanced underlying stats, February 2026 brought another change — FBref lost its advanced Opta data following the end of its licensing agreement. Fantasy Football Scout (which has direct Opta licensing) and Understat now fill that gap for FPL purposes.

With over 12 million registered FPL accounts in 2025/26 — the biggest season on record — the competition for rank has never been tighter. The tools below are the ones the community actually uses to get an edge.

The official FPL app

The official Fantasy Premier League app is your base layer — you cannot avoid it. It is where transfers actually count, where points are tracked, and where your league table lives. Third-party tools are built around it, not as replacements.

The 2025/26 season brought meaningful improvements to the official app's stats page, including xGI data, DEFCON contribution tracking, and a cleaner ICT Index view. It still does not offer fixture analysis, price change predictions, or any form of optimisation — but the gap between it and third-party tools has narrowed slightly on the raw data side.

Live rank and matchday trackers

Live tracking tools are the category that has grown most in 2025/26, driven by the DEFCON rule change and the complexity of the two-chip system. The official FPL site updates rank and bonus points slowly — sometimes hours after matches finish. Dedicated live trackers update in near-real time, which matters when you are trying to understand whether a DEFCON contribution has pushed a player into bonus points, or whether your rival has just overtaken you in your mini-league.

LiveFPL is the most universally used tool in this category — it is the default recommendation in virtually every community thread about price changes and live rank. FPL Gameweek is the specialist for mini-league tracking, offering a level of rival visibility the official site simply does not provide. FPL Focal (fpl.page) sits across both categories — it is the most comprehensive free dashboard in FPL, and its DEFCON tracker in particular has become essential for matchday use in 2025/26.

Transfer planners and chip tools

With two sets of chips to deploy across the season, planning tools have become more valuable than ever. The question is no longer just “who should I buy this week” but “what is the optimal transfer sequence across the next eight gameweeks, and when does each chip deliver maximum expected value?”

fpl.team is the most feature-rich multi-GW planner, with predicted lineups for all 20 clubs and a transfer solver. PlanFPL is a cleaner, simpler alternative for managers who find fpl.team's interface too complex. Fantasy Football Scout sits in this category because of its long-form planning content and Opta-powered stats — it is the best source for set piece takers and DEFCON data when evaluating defensive assets, and it retains direct Opta licensing after the FBref data break in February 2026.

Stats and analysis tools

The best FPL managers do not just track points — they understand why players score them and whether that performance is sustainable. Stats tools give you the underlying numbers: expected goals, expected assists, chance creation, and fixture context. Use these to make the case for a transfer before making it, not to justify one you have already made.

A note on FBref: the guide previously listed FBref as a go-to stats source. As of February 2026, FBref lost its advanced Opta data following the end of its licensing agreement with Stats Perform. It remains useful for basic stats, but for xG, xA, and progressive stats relevant to FPL decisions, Understat and Fantasy Football Scout (which has direct Opta licensing) now cover that ground.

Price change trackers

FPL prices change based on net transfers. If more managers buy a player than sell him, his price rises by £0.1m — and if you own him at the old price, you profit. Price trackers let you see this happening in real time and act before the change locks in at the next transfer window.

Missing a price rise on a player you were going to buy anyway costs you budget you never recover. A price tracker takes less than five minutes to check and has a measurable impact on your final squad value. Note that LiveFPL (listed under live trackers) also covers price changes comprehensively — most managers use it as their primary source for both. FPL Statistics is the dedicated specialist if you want a single-purpose tool.

Lineup optimisers

Optimisers use expected points models to automatically calculate the highest-scoring team for any given gameweek or run of fixtures. The core appeal is removing bias — they do not care which club you support or who scored last week. They find the combination of players that maximises projected points within the FPL rules.

The trade-off: the optimal squad is often the template. High-ownership transfers mean less differential upside. If your goal is top 10k, optimisers are essential. If you want a genuinely unique team, treat them as a starting point rather than a final answer. The two-chip system has made chip strategy optimisation — modelling when to deploy each chip for maximum expected value — a particularly useful application of these tools in 2025/26.

Companion apps

Companion apps handle the matchday experience — live scores, lineups, player ratings, and in-match stats. They are not about making transfers; they are about following what is happening while matches are in play and building the context that informs next week's decisions.