Palworld is set to finally emerge from early access in 2026, developers Pocketpair have announced. There’s a lot of work the game about not-Pokémon, guns, and maunfacturing will need prior to that point, say the studio who’ve been busy staring down Lionel Hutzes who probably know the DK rap off by heart. They’ve also teased that a bunch of new additions are in the works for the 1.0 update.
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“While we have a lot of ideas for where we want to take Palworld, we also need to start thinking about Palworld 1.0,” Pocketpair communications director and publishing manager John ‘Bucky’ Buckley said in the above video announcement. “Beyond just adding new content there’s a lot of cleanup that needs to be done before Palworld can exit early access.
“It’s no secret that Palworld has a lot of quirks and jank, and we want to take the time to properly address those before releasing the game. With that in mind, we plan to start that cleanup this year. Our goal is to ultimately release Palworld next year, in 2026, and we think taking the time now to fix those problems will ultimately lead to a better game.”
As a result, the studio plans to be “a little quiet” for the rest of 2025, with the survival game’s winter update not set to be as chunky as the Feybreak or v0.4 update it got last December. That said, Buckley did still indicate “a few surprises” are planned for that winter update.
The big tease-a-thon continued, with the community manager declaring that a “truly massive amount of content” is in the works for the 1.0 update that’ll bring Palworld out of the early access cocoon it’s occupied since January last year. “We plan to share some sneak peeks about Palworld 1.0 in the very near future,” he concluded.
Amid releasing updates including the likes of crossplay and a Terarria collab so far this year, Pocketpair have been getting a publishing arm up and running. Horror game Dead Take from Tales Of Kenzera: ZAU devs Surgent Studios and retro-handheld-inspired angler Normal Fishing are among the titles the studio have helped release or signed up so far. All while Mario gives them the evils from a window across the road. Make sure to give our Katherine’s review of early access Palworld a read if you’re keen to be reminded what it’s all about.
