Launch dates are the least stable fact in the private server scene, and the next three weeks have more of them than any stretch this year. This page keeps the dates we can stand behind in one place and separates them from the ones that are only announced.
It is split in two on purpose. Verified means we have read the date at its source or reported it from our own check. Announced means the date comes from a server announcement or a listing site and we have not independently confirmed it. If a date moves, it moves here with a note, not quietly.
Verified
Private server launches
- October 15: Sulvus Reforged (WotLK 3.3.5a PvP) opens at 16:00 UTC at wowsulvus.es. See the launch note.
- October 16: Lordaeron.eu Rimeheart, a custom WotLK progressive realm, at 17:00 UTC. Both its realms returned online in its own status feed on October 17, the day after the gate. See the launch-day addendum.
- October 16: uWoW's high-rate Mists of Pandaria realm,
MoP x10. Its own statistics page listed the realm online with 492 players on October 17. - October 16: Nozdor's DUNE, a fresh WotLK x1 to x5 realm with optional hardcore, at 16:00 UTC. Its own page reads that Dune is already open.
- October 17: WoW Circle opens a fresh Legion 7.3.5 x5 realm, dated by the project's own news to 19:00 Moscow (16:00 UTC). Battle for Azeroth x5 is planned for around December 2026 and Shadowlands x5 for around February 2027. See the opening note. Gate result: the project's own status page, read at 18:58 UTC, listed the realm online with 1,978 players and a reported uptime of 2 hours 50 minutes, no queue, 10 ms latency, and 2,055 online across the 7.3.5 line.
- October 16: GrimfallWoW opened Conquest of Azeroth Phase 1, a second product line beside its Classless realm, with a level 20 cap and 21 new custom classes. Read at source on October 17. See the news post.
- October 22: Anachronos, a blizzlike Vanilla progressive realm.
- October 23: Project Epoch Reborn relaunches a Classic+ realm at 16:00 GMT.
- October 23: Stonetavern takes its progressive Project Barrens realm through its next gate, the level 60 cap, on Friday October 23 at 18:00 Vienna time (16:00 UTC). Confirmed at source on October 17: the site listed 155 changes on record with the latest dated October 13 and five open proposals.
- November 6: Project Reforged launches its Classic+ realm at 18:00 CET (17:00 UTC), dated by a countdown on its own front page reading "Starts 06.11.2026 18:00 CET". Its realm statistics, read October 18, show the realm reachable with 32 characters created and 0 players online. See the launch-date note.
- December 15, 2027: Shadowburn, a non-commercial custom WotLK 3.3.5a project, states this date in its own launch countdown. It is the furthest-out launch in the field and is still in development.
WoW: Forever milestones (Blizzard's own dates)
- October 15: Blizzard published the final class deep dive in the series, Paladin, closing out the nine Classic-era classes. See our read of it.
- October 20: Invite-a-Friend launch codes begin going out by email.
- October 21: the free server stress test, open to anyone with no subscription, Game Time, invitation or beta access. Blizzard announced it for October 19 in an October 15 post, then moved it to October 21 in an October 16 update. Windows are North America 2:00 p.m. PDT and Europe 19:00 CEST, with Korea 06:00 KST and Taiwan 05:00 CST on October 22. The beta is taken offline shortly before it starts and is expected back shortly after it ends, the window may shift, and every stress test character, name and guild is wiped afterwards. See the stress test note.
- October 27 to November 3: early name reservation, three characters, first come first served. The stress test wipe clears the field for it.
- November 4: global launch at 3:00 p.m. PT (23:00 UTC).
- December 9: first Forever raids. Blizzard has named Barrow Deeps and Hyjal Summit; a same-day Onyxia's Lair is reported from the roadmap slide but is not confirmed in Blizzard's text.
The full Forever timeline and its sourcing sit in our roadmap post, and the October private server cluster is rounded up in the October dates post.
Announced, not yet verified
- November 28: Frontier, a custom Vanilla+ project.
These come from server announcements and listing sites. They are useful for planning, but do not book a day off around them until they firm up.
Why some things are not here
Several projects in testing have no launch date at all, so they cannot go on a calendar: public test realms and in-development projects are excluded until they publish a date. That is deliberate. A project in alpha or beta is not a launch, and listing it as one would be the exact kind of soft claim this site avoids.
If you want the servers rather than the dates, the full tracker is the place to start, and new and recently opened realms are filterable there.
LAST UPDATED: October 18 2026. Dates in this field move; this page is rechecked as part of our normal cycle, and corrections are shown with a date rather than made silently.