Final Fantasy 14’s next expansion, Dawntrail, finally has a release date. As revealed at PAX 2024, Dawntrail is launching in early access on June 28, before getting a full launch on July 2.
Dawntrail is the fifth expansion for Final Fantasy 14 and follows on from the hugely successful Endwalker expansion in 2021. It’s been a long wait for this follow-up, so expectations are high, particularly asSquare Enixhas previously touted Dawntrail asa “rebirth” for the long-running MMO.
If that release date sounds pretty close to that of a similarly hyped-up expansion - the Shadow of the Erdtree DLC forElden Ring, set to launch on June 21 - then you’re not alone. According to PAX attendees, Final Fantasy 14 director Naoki Yoshida commented that the date was pushed back to avoid Dawntrail clashing with Elden Ring. Whether that’s to avoid competing with Shadow of the Erdtree or so the team get a chance to play it, I’m not sure, but it’s understandable either way.
Now that we have a release date, we can expect more information to be revealed about the expansion soon. But even while we wait for trailers to drop, we already know a fair bit about it going in. Square Enix previously revealed some of the graphical improvements that will go live with Dawntrail,especially to characters with darker skin tones.
We also know that two more jobs are coming to the game through Dawntrail: Vipers and Pictomancers. The latter wasshown off in Januaryand immediately caught everyone’s attention, since they fight through their artwork.
Dawntrail will be the first expansion to launch on Xbox Series X/S, as Final Fantasy 14 only became available on the platform on March 21. Before this, it was released on every Sony console since the PlayStation 3, but never a Microsoft platform. If you do pick it up on Xbox,you’ll have to make in-game purchases using a unique microcurrency, FFXIV Coins, as typical payment methods won’t work. You’ll still have access to your current purchases if you sync accounts across platforms, you just won’t be able to buy anything else on Xbox unless you have these FFXIV Coins. You will also needboth a subscription to Xbox Game Pass and Final Fantasy 14itself to play.
