Arcade racers that earn their place on your phone

Racing games eat storage and battery, so a mobile racer has to justify itself. The ones worth keeping are the arcade-style racers that nail feel over realism.

Neon Drift Circuit is my current favorite because it builds everything around one clean idea: drifting. No thousand-car garage to manage, just the pure pleasure of sliding through a corner and holding your chain.

Touch controls make or break these games. Tilt steering feels romantic until you hit a bump on the train. I almost always switch to on-screen buttons, and the good games let you.

Look for short tracks. A two-minute loop you can memorize beats a sprawling circuit you'll run once. Replayability is the whole point of an arcade racer, and short tracks deliver it.