September 22, 2026: a popularity datum with a first-party mouth. Per Icy Veins Emma (TwitchTracker figures), the Forever beta peaked near 800,000 Twitch viewers, under WoW Classic's 1M+ but in the same bracket, and that for a closed beta, not a launch.
Classic developer Josh Greenfield supplied the quote: the craziest numbers of his 17 years at Blizzard and almost 8 on Classic. Caveats stated honestly: Twitch Drops inflate viewership, and plenty of players never watch. Even discounted, a beta pulling launch-tier attention implies a very busy November.
SOURCES: Icy Veins Emma (Sep 21); Aggrend X post (Sep 18); TwitchTracker figures.