Best Submarine Games to Play on PC in 2025

There’s a unique tension only a sonar ping can deliver. The hush before a torpedo run, the creak of a stressed hull, the quick math that keeps you alive.

This list rounds up the best submarine games on PC in 2025, from methodical WWII sims to deep-sea survival, co-op chaos, and a one-hour panic attack in a steel tube.

Expect plain-spoken breakdowns: what each does well, who it’s for, and why it still holds depth in 2025.

Craving a true skipper’s chair, a builder’s playground, or a claustrophobic story you’ll think about at 2 a.m.? Set depth, rig for silent running, and keep scrolling.

UBOAT (2024)

UBOAT is a WWII submarine simulator with a twist: it’s as much about keeping your crew alive as it is about stalking convoys. You don’t just steer a Type VII sub and fire torpedoes. You must manage food, oxygen, batteries, and morale, then scramble through the hull when damage turns a skirmish into a crisis. Orders arrive from Kriegsmarine HQ, patrols evolve with unexpected tasks, and your budget/reputation feed upgrades like new torpedo types, decoys, and CO₂ absorbers.

You can let officers automate the boring bits or go full skipper, plotting solutions on a realistic torpedo data computer, listen on the hydrophone, or man the 88 mm deck gun yourself. The simulation leans hard into authenticity (trim, ballast, even Earth’s curvature are modeled) but stays approachable, which is why so many players call it the definitive modern WWII subsim. With Steam Workshop support, very positive reviews, and recent updates keeping it fresh, UBOAT delivers nail-biting tension, complex (but fun) management, and memorable sea stories.

Barotrauma (2023)

Barotrauma is a 2D co-op submarine sim with survival-horror and RPG layers, set beneath the ice of Jupiter’s moon Europa. You and up to 16 players juggle real ship work, like steering, sonar, nuclear reactor management, pumps and guns, while patching leaks, treating injuries, crafting supplies, and fending off nightmare fauna. Six distinct roles (Captain, Engineer, Mechanic, Medic, Security, Assistant) and talent trees shape how your crew handles procedurally generated missions and faction reputation.

It’s wildly moddable too: built-in editors for subs and creatures, Steam Workshop support, and even public source code invite the community to tinker. Recent Steam sentiment is Overwhelmingly Positive, and player stories read like ship logs from the brink. You can play solo with bots, but co-op is where the game shines, with teamwork, chaos, and the kind of emergent storytelling only a leaking hull and an oxygen-deprived crew can deliver.

Iron Lung (2022)

Iron Lung shrinks the submarine fantasy into a sweating, metal coffin and dares you to keep your cool. You’re alone inside a one-man sub on an alien moon, steering through a literal ocean of blood with the porthole sealed shut. Navigation becomes a tense puzzle of coordinates, proximity beeps, and a grainy still-camera you fire off to “see” what’s outside. You move around the cramped cabin to operate clunky consoles, snap photos of marked points, and listen as the hull creaks and the pipes hiss, building dread without cheap jump scares.

It’s a short, dread-driven experience (intended to be finished in under an hour), yet its minimalist design, eerie soundscape, and clever map-reading gameplay make it stand out. It is critically praised and sitting on Very Positive Steam reviews, so for players who want a smart, claustrophobic submarine game that gets under your skin fast, Iron Lung is your ticket.

From the Depths (2020)

From the Depths is a voxel-based vehicle builder and strategy sandbox where you design and command submarines (plus ships, planes, blimps, and even spacecraft) and throw them into wars against eight AI factions across campaigns, missions, and co-op modes. With 1,000+ modular parts and a hefty physics model that has buoyancy, drag, sealed compartments, and inertia, your hulls actually float, submerge, and handle based on how you build them.

Weapons aren’t prefab either: you assemble bespoke torpedoes and depth charges (warheads, fuses, seekers), craft cannons piece by piece, or wire up lasers and particle weapons, then hand control to an AI mainframe with swappable “cards” and sensors. Damage matters: breaches flood, rudders limp, barrels bend, and your design choices show. It’s got Steam Workshop support, online PvP/co-op, a planet and campaign editor, and frequent updates that feed a long-running community. And the Steam rating sits at Very Positive. So if you want a submarine game that’s part engineering lab and part naval brawl, this one makes you the shipyard, admiral, and combat systems officer all at once.

Subnautica (2018)

Subnautica is a single-player underwater survival adventure where you crash on an alien ocean planet and have to learn its rules fast. You must manage oxygen, find food and clean water, then craft the tools that let you descend from sunny shallows to deep trenches, lava zones, and eerie bioluminescent rivers. Moment to moment, you’re scanning wrecks for blueprints, building seabed bases to recharge and store loot, and piloting submersibles to push farther into hostile biomes while outsmarting territorial predators, which get especially scary after dark, when the sea gets loud and unfriendly.

It’s equal parts serenity and stress, with a slow-burn mystery told through logs and environmental clues, and it’s stayed vibrant in 2025 with ongoing patches and an Overwhelmingly Positive reception on Steam. If you want a game where submarines are a lifeline in a living, dangerous ecosystem, this one earns its place.

Cold Waters (2017)

Cold Waters is a modern, command-level submarine game that is the spiritual successor to the vintage title Red Storm Rising, and it drops you straight into a Cold War gone hot. You’re the skipper, not the sonar tech: engagements play out in tense real time as you stalk convoys, manage depth and speed, ride thermal layers, and loose wire-guided torpedoes, anti-ship and cruise missiles while dodging helos, noisemakers, and rocket-delivered fish.

It backs the drama with substance: there are over 40 researched ship and sub classes, a realistic sonar model, and AI that uses authentic Soviet antisubmarine warfare tactics. Performance matters in the game’s dynamic campaigns (1968 and 1984, with a later 2000 China Sea scenario) and each success or failure nudges the wider war. The game lands in a sweet spot, being more accessible than hardcore station sims, but still crunchy enough to make you learn some stuff. Add an active mod scene (popular packs like Dot Mod expand subs, missions, and difficulty), and you’ve got a steel-nerved cat-and-mouse experience that still feels fresh in 2025. It’s easy-ish to learn, brutal to master, and perfect for players who want the thrill of command without a wall of dials.

World of Warships (2017)

World of Warships is a free-to-play MMO about big guns, bigger seas, and careful positioning, where 12-v-12 battles play out across huge maps and you captain one of 600+ WWI/WWII-era vessels from 12 nations. You can field anything from bruiser battleships to nimble destroyers, aircraft carriers, and most importantly for this list, submarines. Then, tune each hull with upgrades, commander skills, camo, and signal flags.

The pace leaves room to think: angle your armor, set crossfires, contest caps, and coordinate with a Division or Clan when you want a serious run. Ships are recreated in striking detail not unlike a floating museum. And steady progression through tech trees keeps you chasing the next build without needing to spend actual money if you’re patient. As a submarine pick in 2025, it earns a place because it lets you pilot a sub and drops that stealth-and-torpedo playstyle into a lively, ongoing naval sandbox with PvP and co-op options, where each match becomes a tense little story of timing, spotting, and nerve.

Silent Hunter III (2005)

Silent Hunter III is a WWII submarine simulator where you command a German U-boat in the Battle of the Atlantic, planning patrols, stalking convoys by hydrophone, and lining up torpedo shots before slipping away under depth-charge fire. It runs on a classic 3D engine with a dynamic, unscripted campaign, crew management (promotions, medals, upgrades), and adjustable realism that ranges from assisted targeting to full manual torpedo data computer. There’s even a Naval Academy tutorial to ease you in.

The base game features the key U-boat types (II, VII, IX, XXI) and LAN co-op, while a devoted community keeps it fresh with standout mods like GWX and Living Silent Hunter (plus widescreen and stability fixes many players use), which is a big reason it still carries Very Positive reviews on Steam. It’s tense, methodical, and wonderfully atmospheric, more like Das Boot than an arcade shooter, and that enduring mix of patience and payoff is exactly why it’s still worth playing on PC in 2025.

FAQ: Best Submarine Games to Play on PC in 2025