Final Fantasy 14: A Realm Reborn turned 12 years old this week—pause while I crumble into dust. Alongside a sweet ol’ video message from director and producer Naoki Yoshida came the news I and many others have been waiting for: dates and locations for this expansion’s Fan Festivals.
There are two reasons these dates are important. The first is, of course, getting to go and celebrate the game, potentially meet up with your guildmates, all that fuzzy and heartwarming stuff. But they’re also excellent yardsticks for figuring out when we can probably expect the next expansion to arrive. Square Enix is nothing if not predictable. There are always three Fan Fests. There are always five major patches. There are always two new jobs. You get the idea.
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Except now people are using these dates to plug the numbers and are coming to some dire realisations—this is probably the longest non-pandemic expansion we’re getting, and we might end up going an entire year with only two major patches to show for it.
For reference, here are the dates and locations for each Fan Fest:
- North America: Anaheim, California – April 24 to April 25, 2026
- Europe: Berlin, Germany – July 25 to July 26, 2026
- Japan: Tokyo, Japan – October 31 to November 1, 2026
Side note—I am very pleased for my American Warriors of Light that they no longer have to deal with Las Vegas in the summertime. Very happy for you all.
Back to dates and number crunching, though, new FF14 expansions generally manifest around four to six months after the final Fan Fest has concluded. Dawntrail launched six months after Japan’s 2024 Fan Fest leg, while both Shadowbringers and Stormblood saw a four-month gap.
That means, at the earliest, we’re probably seeing a March 2027 release date for whatever the next FF14 expansion is. At worst… May or June 2027. Almost three entire years after Dawntrail’s launch. Regardless of whether it lands on the earlier or later side of the usual timeline, it puts this expansion as the longest-running one, beating out the Covid-induced extended residency Shadowbringers had.
Compounded with the fact that—if history is anything to go by—Dawntrail only has two more major patches left to go and a minimum of 18 months to cash ’em in, players are not particularly jazzed about this timeline. Patch cadence and “content droughts” have been huge topics plaguing the game since Endwalker, and the thought of having to wait even longer is, uh, not the most exciting thing.
“It’s insane to me that we’re in 7.3 but still have a year and a half until the expansion,” one Reddit commenter wrote. “If 7.4 is at the end of this year, 7.5 would need enough content to somehow carry the game for a year on its own”. Another wrote “Does this mean that we are potentially looking at a three years gap between 7.0 and 8.0… oof,” while another compared FF14 to its biggest competition, writing: “WoW is eating 14’s lunch.”
I’m here to offer some potential hopium, though. In his video, Yoshida rather interestingly says: “Our 2026 Fan Fests will kick off major future plans which we’ll be rolling out at a whirlwind pace.” Considering the narrative has very much been about slowing down the pace over the last couple years—like increasing patch cadence from three months to four and even five months—it has me wondering if the next expansion will be dropping much sooner after the final Fan Fest than we’re used to.
I kind of hope so, honestly. I love the game, but I’ve been running out of reasons to play on a regular basis. Even when I’ve been loving some of the new modes Dawntrail has been pushing out—I actually really liked the 24-player Chaotic raid, and had a lot of fun with Forked Tower despite its atrocious entry requirements—they’re in that weird limbo where the setup time versus playtime and reward is far too skewed in the former’s favour.
It’s a lot of faff sometimes, faff I’m not necessarily willing to deal with. I’m very much hoping 8.0 ramps up how engaging all its bits and pieces are, and that I don’t have to wait almost two years from now to find that out.