I’ve lost count of how many late nights I’ve spent yelling at my screen after a friend scored a last-minute winner against me in eFootball 2023, and I know I’m not the only one. Few gaming moments hit as hard as bragging rights after beating someone you know, or laughing through a chaotic co-op match where no one can get a pass right. A lot of players struggle to navigate the game’s slightly clunky online menu system, though, and end up sticking to random ranked matches instead of playing with people they actually know. If you’ve been struggling to figure out how to play with friends on eFootball 2023, this guide walks you through every available mode, fixes for common glitches, and tips to make your matches run smoothly.
How to Play with Friends on eFootball 2023: Core Mode Options
Before you jump into a match, you’ll want to pick the right mode for your group. eFootball 2023 hides a lot of its multiplayer options behind submenus, so you might not have even seen some of these before. Each mode is built for different group sizes and play styles, so you can pick whatever fits your vibe that day. You don’t have to stick to 1v1 head-to-head if you don’t want to, either – there are options for groups of up to 6 players total.
- 1v1 Friendly Match: The most casual option, with zero impact on your online rank, perfect for settling casual bets or practicing new formations without the stress of losing division points. You can tweak match length, stadium, and even rule sets like disabling offside before you start.
- Co-op Team Play: Team up with 1 or 2 friends to control individual players or full squads against other player groups, great if you prefer collaborative play over competitive head-to-head. You can split control of a single squad between multiple people, or each pick a position to specialize in for a more realistic football experience.
- Custom Creative League: Set up a private league with up to 20 friends, track standings, set custom match rules, and run a full season over weeks for more long-term fun. You can even set promotion and relegation rules if you want to make it feel like a real professional league, with bragging rights on the line for the top spot at the end of the season.
All of these modes work for same-room local play too, if you have friends over and want to play on the same console. You’ll just need extra controllers, and you can skip all the online connection steps entirely.
Step-by-Step Setup for Cross-Platform Friend Matches
Cross-platform play is one of the best features of eFootball 2023, because it means you don’t have to be on the same console as your friends to play together. A lot of users get stuck on this step, though, because the game doesn’t do a great job of explaining how cross-platform friend connections work. I’ve had friends who spent an hour trying to connect via their PS5 friend list before realizing they needed to add each other’s Konami IDs to play with someone on Xbox, so don’t make that same mistake.
First, make sure you’ve linked your platform account to a Konami ID – you can do this from the game’s main settings menu, and it only takes a minute. Once that’s done, head to the “Friends” tab in the online menu, and select “Add Friend via Konami ID”. Type in your friend’s ID, send the request, and once they accept, they’ll show up in your in-game friend list no matter what platform they’re on. This is the most reliable way to connect for anyone looking for how to play with friends on eFootball 2023 across different devices. You don’t need a paid subscription to platform online services for cross-platform friend matches, which is a huge bonus if you don’t want to pay for PS Plus or Xbox Live Gold just to play with friends.
If you’re playing on mobile, the process is exactly the same, but you might want to adjust your control settings before you join a match with console players. Mobile default controls are a lot more limited than controller inputs, so switching to advanced touch controls will level the playing field a bit. You can also connect a Bluetooth controller to your phone if you want a more consistent experience.
Fixes for Common Multiplayer Connection Issues
Even if you follow all the setup steps perfectly, you might run into connection issues every now and then. Most of these problems have super simple fixes, though, and you don’t need to be a tech expert to sort them out. I’ve run into every one of these issues at least a dozen times, so these are all tested fixes that work for most cases. These small checks will save you a lot of frustration when you’re trying to figure out how to play with friends on eFootball 2023 without interruptions.
Always make sure you and your friend are on the same game version first, because Konami pushes small weekly updates that most people don’t even notice. Even a minor version mismatch will block you from joining the same lobby, so go to the game settings menu to check for updates if you can’t see each other’s lobby. If you’re on auto-update, this usually isn’t an issue, but it’s the first thing you should check if something goes wrong.
If you’re getting constant lag or mid-match disconnections, try switching from Wi-Fi to a wired Ethernet connection if you can, or move closer to your router to reduce packet loss. If cross-play isn’t working at all, double check that you haven’t disabled it in the “Online” tab of your game settings – some people turn it off to avoid playing against console players on mobile, and forget to turn it back on. I’ve also found that restarting both your game and your router fixes 90% of unexplained connection errors, so don’t skip that step before you try anything more complicated.
One lesser-known issue: if one of you is playing on mobile data, you’ll almost always run into lag or connection drops. Mobile data has way higher latency than fixed broadband, so save mobile matches for short 10-minute friendlies only, and avoid running full co-op matches on a cellular connection.
Fun Rule Twists to Make Friend Matches More Exciting
After you’ve played a few standard 1v1 matches, you might want to mix things up to keep things interesting. eFootball 2023 has a ton of custom rule options that most people never touch, and you can use them to create some really fun, chaotic matches that don’t just come down to who has the better squad of players. These twists are especially great if you have a big group of friends playing together, or if one player is way more skilled than everyone else.
All-Silver Squad Rule is my go-to for balanced matches: no gold or black ball players allowed, so you can’t just rely on Mbappé or Messi to carry you. It forces you to play with lower-rated players you’d never use normally, and it levels the playing field so skill matters way more than what cards you’ve collected. If you’re playing in the same room, try the one-controller co-op challenge, where you and a friend share the same controller to control a single team – one person uses the left stick to move, the other uses the right stick and buttons to pass and shoot. It’s chaotic, messy, and usually leads to a lot of laughs.
If one player is way better than everyone else, add a handicap: give the weaker player a 2-goal head start, or force the better player to use only youth academy players for the whole match. You can also turn on manual passing only, disable offside, or set match length to 30 minutes for a more grueling, realistic match experience. You don’t have to stick to the default settings, and half the fun is testing out weird rule combinations to see what works for your group.
At the end of the day, the best part of eFootball 2023 isn’t climbing the ranked ladder or collecting rare player cards – it’s the silly, heated matches with people you know. Once you get the hang of how to play with friends on eFootball 2023, you can tweak rules, run custom leagues, and make memories that beat any random online match by a mile. If you run into issues we didn’t cover, drop a comment below and we’ll help you troubleshoot so you can get back to beating your friends as soon as possible.