Best McLaren in CSR2: 65 Records Ranked, Plus Aston Martin

McLaren fans in CSR2 have a strong garage to choose from: 65 world records on our sheet, every one of them in Tier 5. That's one of the biggest Tier 5 lineups of any brand. But a big lineup makes the choice harder, not easier. Which McLaren is actually worth building?

We ranked every McLaren record on our CSR2 world records sheet to find the best McLaren in CSR2, then compared the brand with its closest British rival, Aston Martin. The short answer is one car, then a long gap.

The best McLaren in CSR2: the top ten

McLaren	Record	Rank in Tier 5
Solus GT	6.555	7
F1 GT	6.743	63
W1	6.752	70
720S (E.C. Level 35)	6.807	113
720S GT3X	6.866	158
Speedtail (red, five stars)	6.903	187
F1 (E.C. Level 50)	6.904	189
Speedtail (orange)	6.944	219
Speedtail (silver)	6.945	220
Senna GTR LM ‘Gulf Livery’	6.957	237

From our sheet at the time of writing, out of 890 timed Tier 5 cars. All ten are purple-star records.

The Solus GT is the answer, and it isn't close. Its 6.555 puts it seventh in the whole tier, one of only 11 records in the tier under 6.6 seconds. The next McLaren, the F1 GT, is almost two tenths slower and 56 places further down. If you want the fastest McLaren in CSR2, there's only one choice.

Behind it, the F1 GT and the W1 are almost level, nine thousandths apart. Either is a strong Tier 5 car in its own right, inside the top 70.

One car, then a cliff

McLaren's problem is depth. Only three of its 65 records make the Tier 5 top 100, and only seven make the top 200. The typical McLaren record ranks 551st, below the middle of the tier.

Part of the reason is that the 65 records include a lot of the same car. Four versions of the Elva, including the M1A by MSO and the GOSH Edition, sit within two thousandths of each other around 303rd. Three Sennas share almost the same time at about 341st, and the Senna GTR, its Gulf Livery version and the Sabre by MSO are all within two thousandths at about 238th. Count distinct cars rather than records, and McLaren's garage is smaller than it looks.

At the bottom are the older road cars. The 570S, 675LT Spider and 650S all rank between 874th and 884th of 890. All of those records were set at three or four stars rather than five, so they aren't the cars at their best, but they're also not cars to build for Tier 5.

Same car, very different results

Several McLarens have more than one record, and they show how much the version matters.

• Speedtail: the red car at five stars is 187th. The same red car at three stars is 789th, 1.218 seconds slower. The orange and silver versions sit together at 219th and 220th.
• F1: 189th at Elite Customs Level 50, 375th at Level 0.
• 720S: 113th at Elite Customs Level 35. The plain 720S records sit between 638th and 690th.

If you're buying a McLaren, check the star level and Elite Customs level of the record you're chasing. Our guide to CSR2 maxed cars explains why fully upgrading the parts doesn't change either, and our Elite Customs analysis covers the levels across the game.

The McLarens that tune differently

Most top McLarens run the most common Tier 5 setup: a final drive of 2.00 and 0/100 tyres. The Solus GT, F1 GT and W1 all do. Two families break the pattern.

The SLR 722 records, both the 722 Edition and the 722 S Roadster, use the tyre setting reversed, 100/0, which only 13 of the 890 Tier 5 records use. They also run a long, soft nitrous setting shared by just 32 records in the tier.

The P1 family runs tall final drives, between 3.15 and 3.28, well above the 2.00 that the top three McLarens use. It also does something rare. In nearly every Tier 5 record, the race is faster than the dyno, typically by about a tenth. Only 15 of 890 records aren't, and three of them are P1s: the P1, the P1 GTR and the P1 GTR ‘Pebble Beach’. For these cars, the dyno time is about as good as it gets, so don't expect to beat it on the road. We looked at the dyno gap across the game in CSR2 perfect launch and shifting.

McLaren vs Aston Martin

Aston Martin has almost exactly as many records, 64, but they're spread very differently.

	McLaren	Aston Martin
Records	65	64
Tier 5 records	65	49
Best Tier 5 car	Solus GT, 7th	Valour, 32nd
Tier 5 top 100	3	6
Tier 5 top 200	7	16
Typical Tier 5 rank	551st	312th
Best below Tier 5	none	DBX S, 7th in Tier 4

McLaren has the best car. Aston Martin has the better garage. Pick an Aston Martin at random in Tier 5 and you'll typically land more than two hundred places higher than with a random McLaren.

Aston's best Tier 5 cars are the Valour and the Valiant, which share a 6.672 record across three entries at 32nd to 34th. Behind them come the Valkyrie AMR Pro at 69th and the DBR22 at 84th, a gold-star car in the top 100. The Valkyrie family alone has seven records between 69th and 204th.

Aston Martin also races below Tier 5, where McLaren doesn't appear at all on our sheet. The DBX S, an SUV, ranks 7th of 232 in Tier 4, with the DBX 707 at 20th. In Tier 2, the DB5 is 9th at Elite Customs Level 50.

One Aston oddity: the One-77's record is 0.76 seconds faster than its dyno time, more than seven times the typical gap in Tier 5. The dyno badly undersells that car, so judge it on real runs.

Purple or gold?

Both brands follow the rule from our purple vs gold star study. Where a McLaren has both versions on the sheet, purple is faster on 14 of 15, typically by about 0.05 seconds; the P1 GTR shows the biggest gap at 0.121, and the McLaren GT is the exception, its gold record nine thousandths quicker. Aston Martin's purple cars win all 14 of its pairs, also by about 0.05.

Which should you build?

• The fastest McLaren: the Solus GT, without question.
• A second McLaren: the F1 GT or the W1, both inside the top 70.
• A dependable British garage: Aston Martin. Start with the Valour or Valiant, then the Valkyrie AMR Pro.
• Below Tier 5: Aston Martin's DBX S in Tier 4 and DB5 in Tier 2. McLaren has nothing there.
• Avoid for Tier 5: the 570S, 650S and 675LT Spider, all near the bottom of the tier.

Every car here is in our McLaren and Aston Martin collections, deliverable stock or fully maxed. If you're weighing the British brands against the rest, the fastest car from every brand list and our rankings of CSR2 hypercars and the best Lamborghini cover the other big names.

The verdict

The best McLaren in CSR2 is the Solus GT, seventh in Tier 5 and almost two tenths clear of any other McLaren. After it, the F1 GT and W1 are strong picks, and then the brand falls away quickly. Aston Martin is the opposite: no single car as fast as the Solus GT, but a far deeper Tier 5 lineup and real contenders in Tiers 2 and 4. Choose McLaren for one standout car, and Aston Martin for a garage.