WoW Forever release date: November 4, and what happens before it

World of Warcraft: Forever launches on November 4, 2026 at 3:00 p.m. PST.

It’s one global launch. No region gets it first. A subscription or game time covers access. There is no box price.

Status on November 3: launch is tomorrow. Today is the last day of name reservation, so reserve your names now if you haven’t. The beta has already closed.

Everything below comes from Blizzard’s own pre-purchase announcement. Nothing here is a leak or a countdown site.

The hour, where you are

Zone	Time
Pacific (PST)	Nov 4, 3:00 p.m.
Central (CST)	Nov 4, 5:00 p.m.
Eastern (EST)	Nov 4, 6:00 p.m.
UTC	Nov 4, 23:00
UK (GMT)	Nov 4, 11:00 p.m.
Central Europe (CET)	Nov 5, 12:00 a.m.
Beijing	Nov 5, 7:00 a.m.
Sydney (AEDT)	Nov 5, 10:00 a.m.

Blizzard states the time in PST. November 4 lands after the US clocks go back. Europe has switched by then too. So these offsets are final, with no summer-time correction.

What happens between now and then

All six dates below are from the same announcement.

Date	What
Oct 20	Invite-A-Friend codes start arriving by email
Oct 21	The global beta ends
Oct 27 – Nov 3	Early Name Reservation: create and customise up to three characters
Nov 4, 3 p.m. PST	Launch
Nov 4 – Nov 11	Launch week: invited friends can play without a subscription
Jan 11, 2027	The Warcraft Forever Collection leaves the shop

The last three dates are easy to get wrong.

The Collection is not a permanent edition. It retires in January. Invite codes are for launch week only, and they do not include beta access. Name reservation isn’t early access either: you build the character, not the progress.

Name reservation, in plain terms

• Runs October 27 through November 3.
• Opens 1:00 p.m. PDT on October 27 in North America. Europe opens at 18:00 CET.
• Korea and Taiwan open at 07:00 local time on October 28.
• You need the Digital Upgrade or Collector’s Edition. The Skyborne Heroic Pack, Skyborne Epic Pack and Warcraft Forever Collection count.
• It only works on the WoW account that bought it.
• Up to three characters in total, across all rulesets. Two on PvP leaves one for Normal or Role-Play.
• Names are first come, first served. Blizzard says desired names cannot be guaranteed.

So the practical play is simple. Decide your race, class, name and look before October 27. Then be ready that morning.

Want the race list first? See playable races. Still choosing? The race × class matrix has all 56 legal combinations. Every race and class page lists what that pick actually gets.

Do you have to buy an upgrade?

No. A subscription or game time is the only thing you need to play on November 4.

The paid upgrades add cosmetics. Two of them also add things you cannot get later. Beta access is one, and it expires on October 21. The other is 30 days of game time. Name reservation comes with any upgrade purchase. Blizzard lists the current editions and regional prices on the Battle.net Shop.

The beta is nearly over

The beta runs through October 21. This site is built by reading the beta client, so that date matters here too. 1.60.1.70450 is the last build we have data for. Once the beta closes, there is nothing new to read until the game is live.

The comparison page holds everything the client changed since Classic. That’s 16 new race and class combinations and 466 talents. Every spell rank sits next to its Classic counterpart.

Want to see the beta played at its best before it ends? The Forever Open final is a $100,000 duel tournament on the beta weekend.

What to do with the next two weeks

• Pick a main. First 40 hours is ordered by decision, not by topic.
• Check the leveling math. The XP calculator prices every buff you can stack.
• Plan the talents now. The talent calculator runs on the client’s own 466 talent entries, and each class page has its spells by level list.
• Read the changes that bite. Ten things Forever does differently covers the habits from Classic that cost people levels.