Grinding Gear Games, which has run Path of Exile since 2013, announced at ExileCon 2026 that Path of Exile 2 leaves early access on December 11, 2026. The action RPG goes free-to-play the same day, which is how the first game has always worked. RPG Site reports that the full release covers PC through Steam, the Epic Games Store and the standalone client, plus PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S. It also says the game comes to Mac for the first time.
Early access began on December 6, 2024, as a paid release on PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S. For almost two years since, Path of Exile 2 has been a building with scaffolding still up on one side: open for business, but with its last rooms closed. The sequel was first announced at ExileCon in 2019 as a new campaign that would share the first game’s endgame. In 2023 Grinding Gear made it a standalone game with six acts, and the full release is the point where all six are finally open.
Acts 5 and 6 go back to Oriath, a city now wrecked by war and corruption, and the studio’s trailer calls the trip A Return to Oriath. RPG Site lists slums, abandoned noble estates, a desecrated temple district and a grand arena among the stops. That is where I stop.
The Shadow, the Knight and a war for Wraeclast
The new class is the Shadow, built on stealth, daggers and traps. Each kill resets the cooldown on Stealth, so ambushes chain. Traps laid while hidden go off in the order you placed them once Stealth ends, and Shades, which are shadowy copies of the Shadow, distract enemies and repeat its attacks. "On release, the Shadow has two Ascendancy classes: the Assassin and the Infiltrator," Grinding Gear wrote in its full release announcement on Steam.
The Duelist gets the Knight, who fights with War Banners, a chariot charge, and a Squire you can equip with any melee skill gem. Grinding Gear's Steam announcement lists a second Duelist Ascendancy for 1.0, the Master-at-Arms, while the studio's press material says it arrives at a later date. By RPG Site's count, the full release has 10 classes and 26 Ascendancies.
The launch league, Conquerors of Wraeclast, is a challenge league about sieges. Players build castles, take territory with siege engines, war elephants and two-headed Chimeras, and conquer three rival clans before facing Severa, an ancient vampire lord. A Faction Conquest feature has rival players racing to capture 100 castles.
The first game is still getting expansions 13 years after launch, with Covens of Umbra due on November 13. So December 11 is less a finish line than the day the scaffolding comes down and the whole building opens, and the door costs nothing. Path of Exile 2 is on Steam in early access until then.
