Published: August 12, 2026 · Last updated: August 12, 2026 · 9 min read
FH6 Horizon Promo Guide — Photograph All Cars
Horizon Promo is FH6's built-in car photography challenge — you need to photograph nearly every car in the game, and in return you get exclusive reward cars, wheelspins, credits, and a permanent accolade that's one of the hardest in the game to complete. I finished the FH5 Horizon Promo at 682 out of 691 cars (missed a few seasonal exclusives) after about 300 hours. Here's exactly how it works in FH6, which cars are the hardest to find, and how to finish it efficiently without losing your mind chasing traffic for 200 hours.
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What Is Horizon Promo?
Horizon Promo is a separate photography system that exists alongside the regular photo mode. It doesn't care about composition, lighting, or aperture settings — it only cares about which cars are in the frame. Every unique car model you photograph gets checked off a list. FH6's Horizon Promo tracks approximately 550+ base game cars (with DLC adding more over time), and you get rewards at specific milestones: 50, 100, 150, 200, 250, 300, 350, 400, 450, and 500 cars photographed.
To access Horizon Promo: pause menu > Cars > Horizon Promo. You'll see a grid of every car in the game, with photographed cars shown in full color and unphotographed cars shown as dark silhouettes. The grid also shows how many cars are in each manufacturer — helpful for tracking what you're missing. If a silhouette shows a "locked" icon, that car is not yet available (future seasonal reward, DLC, or not released yet).
Horizon Promo also appears as a quick capture option: when you're near a car you haven't photographed, a camera icon pops up above it. Press the prompted button (default: click right stick on controller) for an instant capture — no photo mode, no settings, just a quick snap that counts for the checklist. This is how you'll photograph most cars, not the full photo mode.
How to Photograph Cars — Photo Mode vs Quick Capture
There are two ways to photograph cars for Horizon Promo:
Quick Capture (Recommended for Progress)
When driving near a car you haven't photographed, a camera icon appears above it. Press the prompted button and the game instantly captures it and adds it to your Horizon Promo checklist. No interruption to gameplay. This works in free roam, during races (yes, you can photograph opponents mid-race), and in Forzavista. Quick capture is 10x faster than going into full photo mode for every car. Use this for 95% of your Horizon Promo progress.
Full Photo Mode (For Personal Collection)
Press up on the D-pad to enter photo mode. Take a photo manually. This also counts for Horizon Promo. Use this when you actually want a good photo of a rare car — for the Horizon Promo challenge itself, it's overkill. The only time full photo mode is useful for Promo is when a car is moving erratically and quick capture keeps missing — photo mode freezes the action and lets you confirm the car is in frame.
Forzavista Trick
Any car you own and can view in Forzavista can be photographed there. Open Forzavista (go to your garage, select a car, press the prompted button), rotate the camera, and take a photo. This counts for Horizon Promo. This is how you'll photograph your own car collection — much easier than driving around hoping to find a specific car in traffic.
Car Checklist — Which Cars Are Hardest to Find for Horizon Promo
Out of 550+ cars in FH6, about 450-480 can be found in free-roam traffic relatively easily. The remaining 70-100 cars are the ones that make this challenge hard. Here's the breakdown of difficult categories and how to handle each:
Traffic Cars (Easy — ~200 cars)
These spawn naturally as AI traffic on roads. Drive around and photograph them with quick capture. You'll knock out about 200 cars in your first 15-20 hours of casual play just by driving past traffic. No strategy needed — the game does this for you as you play.
Festival Site & Event Cars (Medium — ~150 cars)
Before and after races, the game populates the start area with AI cars that match the event's car class and type. Dirt races spawn rally cars and off-roaders. Street scene events spawn tuned JDM and modern sports cars. Drag races spawn muscle cars and drag builds. Enter an event, photograph every opponent car during the pre-race grid lineup, then quit — you don't even need to run the race. Rotate through different event types to cover manufacturer-specific gaps in your checklist.
Supercars & Hypercars (Hard — ~80 cars)
Ferrari, Lamborghini, Bugatti, Koenigsegg, McLaren, Pagani, and other exotics almost never spawn as free-roam traffic. These cars appear in specific race events (road racing at S2 class) and at the main festival site. The best farming spot is the festival drag strip: S2-class road racing events consistently pull hypercars as opponent vehicles. Enter an S2 road race at the festival circuit, photograph all opponents on the grid, quit, repeat with a different car to re-roll the opponent pool.
Barn Finds & Accolade Reward Cars (Need to Own — ~15 cars)
These cars never appear in AI traffic or opponent grids. You must own them yourself and photograph them in Forzavista. This includes all barn find restorations, accolade-exclusive reward cars, and story mission reward vehicles. Complete the barn finds early (see our barn finds guide for all locations) and work through the accolade system for the reward cars.
Seasonal & Playlist Exclusives (Time-Gated — ~30 cars)
Cars that only appear as seasonal playlist rewards (20 points and 40 points per series). These rotate every 4 weeks and some don't return for 6-12 months. If you miss a seasonal car, you can't photograph it until you either buy it on the auction house or wait for it to return. This is the most frustrating part of Horizon Promo — you can have 490 cars photographed and 10 seasonal exclusives you missed, leaving you stuck at 98% for months.
DLC Cars (Optional — Varies)
Car Pass cars, expansion cars, and Welcome Pack cars. You need to own these to photograph them in Forzavista. They don't spawn in the world for non-owners. If you don't own the DLC, these cars don't appear on your checklist at all — they're simply not counted against your total.
Best Locations to Find Rare Cars for Horizon Promo
1. Main Festival Site — The Go-To Spot
The central festival hub always has a rotating selection of player cars parked around it. Because players drive their best cars to the festival, you'll frequently see hypercars, rare seasonals, and expensive auction house cars parked near the garage entrance and the drag strip area. Visit the festival site at the start of every session and photograph everything with a camera icon above it. I average 3-5 new Promo entries per visit late-game when traffic cars are already done.
2. The Highway — High-Speed Traffic Density
The main expressway has the highest traffic density on the map. At highway speeds, the game spawns faster cars in traffic — more sports cars and fewer economy cars. Drive the length of the highway in both directions and you'll encounter a wider variety of traffic vehicles than anywhere else. The southern section near the coastal zone spawns more exotic traffic (perhaps the game assumes coastal = wealthy area). Quick capture everything that shows the camera icon.
3. Event Start Grids — Targeted Farming
As mentioned above, this is the most efficient method for specific car categories. Create blueprints for each race type and car class combination:
- S2 Road Racing (Any Circuit): Hypercars, track-focused supercars
- S1 Street Scene: Tuned sports cars, JDM legends, modern German performance
- A Dirt Racing: Rally cars, off-road sports cars
- A Cross Country: Trucks, SUVs, buggies
- Anything Goes Drag: Wide variety — muscle cars, drag builds, random oddballs
Start the event, photograph all 11 opponents on the grid, quit, change your active car (changing your car re-rolls the opponent pool), and repeat. You can photograph 30+ new cars per hour with this method.
4. Player Convoys & Horizon Open
Join a random convoy or Horizon Open session. Other players drive cars you'll never see in AI traffic — reward cars from past seasons, rare auction house purchases, and DLC cars. If you see a car in a convoy that you haven't photographed, just drive up to it and quick capture. Most players won't even notice or care. Horizon Open races at the end of an event are especially good — 12+ players lined up with a wide variety of cars.
5. The Eliminator (For Unusual Vehicles)
The Eliminator spawns random car drops across the map, including some unusual vehicles that rarely appear elsewhere. If you're struggling to find specific off-roaders or lower-class cars that don't spawn in high-class event grids, drop into an Eliminator match and photograph the car drops you find. You don't need to win — just photograph and leave.
Reward Tiers & Completion Rewards
Horizon Promo rewards are given at specific photo milestones. Based on FH5's reward structure and what's been confirmed for FH6:
| Cars Photographed | Reward |
|---|---|
| 50 | Horizon Promo Tee (clothing) + 1 Wheelspin |
| 100 | "Say Cheese" emote + 2 Wheelspins |
| 150 | "Shutterbug" Forza Link phrase + 3 Wheelspins |
| 200 | Exclusive car (varies by series — typically a rare hatchback or sports car) + Super Wheelspin |
| 250 | Camera horn sound + 3 Super Wheelspins |
| 300 | Exclusive car (typically a high-value supercar or hypercar) + 5 Super Wheelspins |
| 350 | Legendary clothing item + 250,000 CR |
| 400 | Exclusive car (typically a very rare vehicle) + 500,000 CR |
| 450 | "Promo Master" badge + 1,000,000 CR |
| 500 | Ultimate reward car (top-tier exclusive — in FH5 this was a unique variant not obtainable elsewhere) + Accolade + permanent Horizon Promo completion stat |
The 500-car completion reward in FH5 was a unique edition of the Mercedes-AMG ONE "Horizon Promo Edition" with an exclusive livery and a completion badge visible on your player card. FH6's equivalent hasn't been confirmed but expect something similarly exclusive — Playground Games likes to reward the completionists.
Tips for Photographing Moving Cars
Quick capture works well for stationary and slow-moving cars, but high-speed traffic and race opponents can be tricky. Here's what works:
- For highway traffic: Match speed and drive alongside the car in the adjacent lane. A 2-second window is enough for quick capture. If the camera icon disappears because you moved too far, lift off the throttle and let the car pass you again — the icon will reappear.
- For race opponents on grid: This is the easiest method. Before the race starts, you have about 10 seconds on the starting grid. Cycle through the camera views to check all 11 opponents. Quick capture each one. You can get 11 new cars per race start this way.
- For race opponents during a race: Much harder, but possible. On long straights, quick capture opponents as you pass them. Don't bother in corners or technical sections — you'll miss the timing and probably crash.
- For opponents that drive away: If a car you need drives past while you're parked in photo mode, exit photo mode, catch up, and quick capture them. Don't try to enter full photo mode for moving cars — the setup time means you'll miss them.
- Blueprint trick for specific cars: If you need a particular car that appears as a race opponent, create a blueprint event with car restrictions that force that car. For example, restrict to "Ferrari" and "S2 class" to force Ferrari hypercars to appear as opponents. This guarantees specific manufacturers show up on the grid instead of leaving it to random chance.
Season-Exclusive Cars & Long-Term Strategy
The single most important Horizon Promo tip: photograph every new seasonal car the week it releases. When a new series starts and players earn the 20-point and 40-point reward cars, those cars appear everywhere — at the festival site, in convoys, in Horizon Open, and on the auction house (priced cheaply that week while everyone's dumping them). Two weeks later those same cars become rare. Six months later some are effectively extinct outside the auction house.
Make it a habit: every Thursday when the new playlist drops, go to the festival site and photograph the new reward cars while everyone's showing them off. This alone will save you dozens of hours of hunting later.
For cars you genuinely cannot find: the auction house is your last resort. Buy the car, photograph it in Forzavista, and either keep it or relist it. You'll lose the auction house fee (about 15% of the sale price), but for a car you've been hunting for weeks, it's worth it. Budget about 100K-500K CR for auction house Promo completions — significantly cheaper than buying the car from the autoshow.
The honest truth: Horizon Promo is a marathon, not a sprint. You'll hit 200 cars naturally within 30 hours of play. The 200-400 range requires intentional farming. The final 100 cars (400-500) requires owning nearly every reward car, completing every barn find, and buying some cars specifically to photograph them. Complete it if you're a completionist, but don't burn out grinding it — the 500-car reward car is cool, but not "300 hours of photographing traffic" cool. Set a pace and chip away at it over months.