Tuning Points are the permanent progression currency in Star Wars: Galactic Racer. Spend them between Campaign Tours to improve a speeder’s starting stats, and those upgrades stay with the vehicle even when a run goes badly and the temporary build disappears.
The basic strategy is simple: use normal Races when you want relatively safe progression, target Eliminators when you trust your driving and want points faster, and use Scenarios when you want a larger reward without putting the current Campaign Tour at risk. When spending the points, resist the temptation to blindly dump everything into one stat. Each vehicle has different handling problems, and the best permanent build is the one that fixes the mistakes actually ending your runs.
Quick answer: Standard Races are the safer Tuning Point route, Eliminators pay substantially better when you reach the final three, and completed Scenarios give the largest regular lump sum. Permanent upgrades are bought between Tours from the Vehicle Select screen, each vehicle can reach Level 15, and the price of every new level rises as that vehicle becomes stronger.
Checked: October 16, 2026. Exact balance values can change in later patches.
Table of Contents
What Tuning Points actually do
Galactic Racer has several progression layers, and Tuning Points are the one that matters between Campaign attempts. The Parts, Abilities, and temporary +1/+2 stat upgrades you assemble during a Tour belong to that particular run. Tuning Point upgrades are different: they permanently improve the starting stats of the vehicle you invest in.
That means getting Knocked Out does not wipe out everything you achieved. The temporary build disappears, but the permanent Tuning Point investment remains, giving the next attempt a stronger baseline.
Permanent progression is tracked per speeder, so improving the Landspeeder does not automatically make the Speeder Bike or Skim Speeder stronger. Concentrating early investment on the vehicle you actually use is usually more effective than trying to level the entire garage evenly.
How to earn Tuning Points in Galactic Racer
| Event | Tuning Points | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Standard Race | +1 | Safer, steady progression |
| Eliminator | +4 for reaching the final three | Confident players farming faster |
| Scenario | +10 for completion | Large payout without risking Campaign progress |
If you are still learning tracks or protecting a fragile Tour, favor Standard Races. They do not pay much, but they are considerably less dangerous than an Eliminator. You can keep building permanent progression without repeatedly gambling the entire Tour on a high-pressure event.
If you are driving well and have enough Tour protection, Eliminators are the better Campaign farming choice. They are marked with the skull icon and pay four times the normal Race amount when you survive into the final three. That makes them attractive, but only if the current vehicle and route justify the risk.
Scenarios pay 10 Tuning Points on completion and sit outside the main Campaign run. They take longer and culminate in a demanding finale, but failing one does not destroy your active Campaign progress. For an uncertain player who dislikes risking a good Tour, that makes Scenarios surprisingly useful: the challenge is real, but the consequences are easier to live with.
Launch-version note: Current guides agree on the +4 Eliminator and +10 Scenario rewards. Some sources disagree on whether the +1 Standard Race point requires a top-three finish or simply completing the event. If you are routing specifically to farm points, check the reward panel on the selected Race in your current version before committing.
For a deeper look at route risk, see our Galactic Racer Campaign Tour guide.
How to spend Tuning Points
Tuning Points are not spent in the middle of a Tour. Invest them from the Vehicle Select screen before beginning a new run, where the Upgrade Vehicle menu lets you buy permanent boxes in the six stat bars.
Each permanent box also raises the vehicle’s overall level by one. A speeder starts at Level 1 and caps at Level 15, so you can buy 14 permanent upgrades in total for that vehicle. Importantly, the price depends on the vehicle’s current level, not on which stat you choose. A late Cornering point costs just as much as a late Afterburner point if both are raising the vehicle from the same level.
| Vehicle level | Cost | Running total |
|---|---|---|
| 1 → 2 | 1 | 1 |
| 2 → 3 | 3 | 4 |
| 3 → 4 | 4 | 8 |
| 4 → 5 | 6 | 14 |
| 5 → 6 | 8 | 22 |
| 6 → 7 | 9 | 31 |
| 7 → 8 | 11 | 42 |
| 8 → 9 | 13 | 55 |
| 9 → 10 | 14 | 69 |
| 10 → 11 | 16 | 85 |
| 11 → 12 | 17 | 102 |
| 12 → 13 | 19 | 121 |
| 13 → 14 | 20 | 141 |
| 14 → 15 | 22 | 163 |
So maxing one speeder from Level 1 to Level 15 costs 163 Tuning Points, before considering the separate cost of unlocking another vehicle. The rising price is why frequent late-game respecs can become surprisingly expensive.
What every Galactic Racer vehicle stat does
| Stat | What it changes | Who should care most |
|---|---|---|
| Afterburner | Acceleration, deceleration/braking response, and Afterburner boost performance | Almost everyone; especially players recovering from contact or slow corners |
| Ramjet | How much speed the Ramjet boost adds | Confident racers who can manage heat and long boost windows |
| Resilience | Resistance to damage, knockback, Malfunctions, and negative status effects | Players losing runs to contact, acid, hazards, or repeated mistakes |
| Cornering | How quickly and tightly the vehicle can turn at speed | Anyone running wide, clipping walls, or struggling while boosting through turns |
| Vehicle maneuver | Improves Drift, Kinetic Burst, Knife Edge, or the relevant class-specific maneuver | Players who actively build their racing line around that vehicle’s signature move |
| Battery | Raises maximum Energy available for Abilities | Ability-heavy builds; low priority if you rarely spend all your Energy |
How the Speed value actually works
The Speed number shown above the stat bars is the vehicle’s unboosted top speed. Player testing indicates that every permanent stat box raises this value by the same amount on the normal Campaign speeders: about 4 km/h per box, no matter which stat receives the upgrade.
That means a Resilience point still nudges the displayed base Speed upward even though its unique benefit is defensive. The important choice is therefore not “which stat increases Speed?” They all do. The useful question is which secondary effect helps your driving most.
Best Tuning Point upgrades for each vehicle type
There is no single perfect allocation. Your preferred Racer Style, Parts, Abilities, difficulty, and most importantly your own driving habits can make a “suboptimal” stat far more valuable than the theoretical meta choice.
Landspeeder: Afterburner first, then decide how clean your handling is
The Landspeeder is heavy, forgiving, and built around Drift. If you already hold clean lines, Afterburner followed by Ramjet is a strong speed-focused default. Afterburner is especially useful because it improves acceleration as well as the boost itself, helping the heavier craft recover after a slow turn or collision.
If you keep sliding wide, however, spend on Cornering or Drift rather than blindly chasing Ramjet. Resilience is also valuable before hazard-heavy stages such as Sentinel I.
Speeder Bike: control the twitchiness before chasing maximum speed
The Speeder Bike rewards aggressive braking and explosive corner exits, but it is less forgiving than the Landspeeder. Cornering and Kinetic Burst are sensible early investments if the bike still feels nervous, while Resilience buys margin against the contact and mistakes a lighter machine feels more sharply.
Once you can consistently rotate the bike and launch cleanly out of corners, shift toward Afterburner and Ramjet for outright pace.
Skim Speeder: Knife Edge deserves early attention
The Skim Speeder lives on momentum and its Knife Edge maneuver. Current testing suggests putting roughly four to five permanent boxes into Knife Edge relatively early, because an underdeveloped Knife Edge can bleed a lot of speed through the turns where the vehicle is supposed to shine.
Cornering is the natural partner if you are still missing lines. Once the handling is comfortable, Afterburner and Ramjet turn the Skim Speeder’s already strong momentum into serious pace.
Do not upgrade for somebody else’s driving style. If Ramjet guides keep telling you to invest in speed but you lose every good run by missing the same corner, Cornering is the faster upgrade in practice. Likewise, Battery is poor value for a racer who rarely activates Abilities, but can become essential in a build that burns through Energy constantly.
For the broader differences between the machines, see our Galactic Racer vehicle classes guide.
How Tuning Point respecs work
You can reset a vehicle’s permanent allocation from Vehicle Select. The reset costs 2 Tuning Points and refunds the points you previously invested, allowing you to rebuild the stat spread.
Two points sounds cheap, and early on it is. The problem is repeated respeccing. Because every reset removes another two points from your total while high vehicle levels become increasingly expensive, constantly rebuilding can eventually leave you short of the 163 points needed to restore a Level 15 vehicle from scratch.
Use respecs when you have learned something meaningful: you switched your main vehicle, discovered that your build never uses Battery, or want to prep for a planet where Resilience suddenly matters. Do not pay two points every Tour just because one stat looked slightly less impressive in the previous race.
More Star Wars: Galactic Racer guides on G2A News
- Star Wars: Galactic Racer beginner’s guide: 12 things the game doesn’t explain
- Star Wars: Galactic Racer Tour guide: Which Campaign events should you choose?
- Star Wars: Galactic Racer vehicle classes explained
- Star Wars: Galactic Racer build guide: Racer Style and Favor combinations that make sense
- Star Wars: Galactic Racer planet hazards guide: How to survive acid, ice, lava, and heat
Build the speeder you can actually finish with
Tuning Points are most useful when you stop treating them as a race to fill bars and start treating them as a way to remove the weakness that keeps ending your Tours. Faster players can push hard into Afterburner and Ramjet. A Speeder Bike driver still learning the machine may get more value from Cornering and Kinetic Burst. A Skim Speeder pilot probably wants Knife Edge functioning properly before worrying about theoretical maximum speed.
The game gives you enough freedom to rebuild, but not enough that every decision is meaningless. Spend deliberately, farm the event difficulty you can actually handle, and let the permanent upgrades make each return to the Galactic League a little less forgiving for everybody else.