• Best kart combo for racing and Grand Prix mode
• Best kart combo for Time Trial

Best kart combo for racing and Grand Prix mode

The best combo in Mario Kart World for racing is Baby Blooper and a lightweight racer such as a Baby character, Dry Bones, Goomba, Para-biddybud or Swoop.

The reason for this is you want to focus on boosting one stat - acceleration. During Grand Prix, Knockout Tour, online matches or any situation where you’re up against others, items such as shells and banana skins will be flying left right and centre, and even the best players won’t get through a race unscathed. This is where having high acceleration comes in handy, helping you get back to speed as fast as possible after spinning out.

The Baby Blooper marries strong acceleration without sacrificing too much speed or handling. Handling is very important, as without it, you won’t feel agile enough to weave through the track confidently. This is an area where you might want to experiment; for me, the way Baby Blooper controls feels right, but it’s also worth trying other high acceleration karts such as Roadster Royale or Buggybud, which are all viable options that adjust acceleration, speed, or handling between them for something you feel comfortable with.

There’s ultimately not a great deal between them, but as Baby Blooper is one that is currently top of the list for most players and in our experience, it’s the best place to start.

When it comes to a character choice to combine your kart with, you want to go for someone lighter in weight, which results in higher acceleration. (Heavier characters, alternatively, have higher speeds - which is important for Time Trial, which we’ll get to in a moment). Technically, Baby Daisy, Baby Peach, Para-biddybud and Swoop (the latter of which is a character unlock using Kamek) are the highest acceleration characters, but the difference between them and light characters such as Baby Mario, Baby Luigi, Baby Rosalina, Dry Bones and Goomba are slight enough that you may as well go for your favourite. (This pre-release weight classes chart by ItsManu001 on reddit is a solid visual breakdown of how the roster stacks up.)

I was always partial to Baby Blooper from stats alone, but when I combined it with a light character (sorry to leave you trackside, Luigi) then it was no coincidence that I started winning 150cc races more regularly.

You can see the difference between light characters Baby Daisy and Dry Bones, as well as the heaviest character in the roster, Bowser, in the Baby Blooper so you have an idea of how important character choice can be:

Ultimately, how you race and utilize driving mechanics and items is how you will perform best (let’s discount luck being a factor here!) but the foundation is a strong kart and character combo is going to put you in the best possible stead.

That’s the combination for racing against others. What about Time Trial?

Best kart combo for Time Trial

While you want to focus on acceleration in the cut and thrust of racing, Time Trials is where you’ll want to maximise speed in the majority circumstances - after all, there are no other racers or items getting in the way, and since you’re now experiencing clean laps, you can be certain you’ll be getting high speeds at all times.

There’s some nuance here depending on the course - which we’ll get to a second - but the best kart combo for Time Trials in Mario Kart World is generally a heavy character such as Bowser, and a well-rounded kart such as Reel Racer, Baby Blooper or Stellar Sled.

At its simplest, Bowser is the heaviest character with the highest speed. From there, by combining it with a vehicle with decent handling and acceleration, it means Bowser can be better controlled and get more out of mini-boosts.

There are three karts which have decent handling stats - Reel Racer, Baby Blooper or Stellar Sled - but also different strengths according to the track you’re on. As discussed earlier, Baby Blooper has both good handling and strong acceleration, with this latter stat having an impact on mini-turbo performance, an important move to squeeze out faster times on those corner-heavy tracks. On the flip side, Stellar Shed is one of the highest - if not the highest - speed stat kart in the game, so it’s particularly useful for courses with fewer corners and turns. Reel Racer, meanwhile, is a good middle ground between these two, with both strong speed and acceleration, and could work better in some situations.

What’s important is the best kart and character is dependant on the track in question, and there’s a good way to see what is currently best - and that’s by checking a given track’s Time Trial leaderboards to see what’s topping the charts. This is also where you might see a different kart or character than the above, which is where players are leaning on their other stats (both visible, and possibly hidden) to deal with a given course’s quirks. Between that and a likely shifting meta, this is always worth a look to see what the very best players are using.

That said, as with the racing kart combo pick, it’s ultimately what you feel comfortable racing with. If you can pull off a faster time with a kart with handling that suits you, then that’s more important than attempting to grapple with a kart that you're struggling with. Also, looking at the very best of the best - unless you’re also challenging those times - should be taken with a pinch of salt since they’re putting in hours of practice to top the leaderboards, but it’s at least useful for ideas when setting a good time on your favourite track.

Hope this helps you come first in Rainbow Road!