Treasure Hunters is a short window. It went live with v43.00 on November 1, 2026, and reports point to a Chapter 7 end event on Saturday, December 5, so there’s far less time than usual to level a pass. On Crossbones Isle, Gold Bars are vaulted and Vending Machines are gone, so your old landing-and-shopping routine needs a rethink.
The decision that matters most this time is the pass: buy it only if you’ll play most weeks until its timer runs out.
| Detail | Status |
|---|---|
| Current season | Treasure Hunters, a Chapter 7 mini-season |
| Started | November 1, 2026 (v43.00) |
| Chapter 7 end event | Reported for Saturday, December 5, 2026; not in Epic’s launch post |
| End time | Not announced by Epic |
| Chapter 8 | No date from Epic; reports range from late November to mid-December |
| Fortnite OG | Latest season is Chapter 1 Season X, started September 3, 2026 with its own OG Pass; no end announced |
When Treasure Hunters ends
Reports quote Epic’s v43.00 patch notes telling players to keep Saturday, December 5 open for a Chapter 7 end event, but that line isn’t in Epic’s launch post. The launch post gives no end date either, so the pass timer in game is the place to confirm it. That’s where things stood on November 2, 2026; look again in the last week of November.
What time? Epic hasn’t said. No start hour for the December 5 event has been posted. Some countdown timers show December 5 with an exact hour attached, but Epic hasn’t confirmed when the Treasure Hunters pass expires or at what time, so treat those clocks as placeholders.
Treasure Hunters is still Chapter 7, not the start of Chapter 8. It’s a mini-season bridging Override and the next chapter, and Epic calls it Treasure Hunters rather than Chapter 7 Season 5. If it wraps on December 5, it will have run about 34 days, less than half the length of any full Chapter 7 season.
Override, Chapter 7 Season 4, ran 73 days from August 20 to November 1, 2026, and closed with the v43.00 downtime at 1 AM ET (05:00 UTC). Some timers, including the in-game pass, had shown October 31, but the changeover came on November 1.
Is the Treasure Hunters pass worth buying?
Two facts drive this. Since March 19, 2026, the standard Battle Pass has cost 800 V-Bucks, and finishing it pays 800 V-Bucks back. The Treasure Hunters price hasn’t been confirmed outside the game, so check the pass tab for the real price, and whether completion pays back the same way, before you spend.
The catch is time. A pass only pays for itself if you finish it, and this one gets about five weeks instead of the ten-plus weeks a full season gives you. Pass cosmetics can come back later, but not until at least 18 months after the pass expires, and Epic doesn’t promise any return at all.
| Option | Best for | Why | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Buy now and play most weeks | Players logging in several times a week until the pass timer runs out | You get the full window to level. Recent standard passes paid back 800 V-Bucks when finished; check this pass’s tab to confirm | No announced Battle Pass XP event to catch you up if you fall behind |
| Buy for one reward | You want one outfit and can see roughly where it sits on the pass | You only need to reach that level, not finish | A level you don’t reach stays locked, and a shop return is 18+ months away and not guaranteed |
| Skip and save your V-Bucks | Players with a few sessions a month | Keeps V-Bucks for a pass with a full season behind it | Epic hasn’t dated Chapter 8, so the next pass has no confirmed start |
My take: if you can’t picture yourself playing most weeks between now and the end event, skip it. The payback only works for players who finish, and a five-week mini-season is a hard pass to finish.
What Epic has dated for November
Epic has dated most of November in its launch post, including a weekly arrival that started with Captain’s Day on launch day:
| Date (2026) | What’s on | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Every Monday from 9 AM ET | Mastery Monday | 2x Sprite XP and 2x Sprite Dust, not Battle Pass XP |
| November 1 | Captain’s Day: A$AP Rocky arrives | Weekly arrival, launch week |
| November 6 | One Piece: Zoro Cup | First of two One Piece cups |
| November 7 | Lil Uzi arrives | Weekly arrival, week 2 |
| November 12 | Gold Sprite variant | Bonus XP from eliminating opponents |
| November 13 | One Piece: Buggy Cup | Second One Piece cup |
| November 14 | Hatsune Miku and Kasane Teto arrive | Weekly arrival, week 3 |
| November 21 | Oscar arrives | Weekly arrival, week 4 |
Epic says a new one arrives every week but hasn’t posted dates after November 21. If you’re after One Piece outfits in the Item Shop, the releases run through the first two weeks of November, so that’s when to keep V-Bucks on hand.
What to do first: build your Sprite plan around Mondays. Mastery Monday is the only recurring boost Epic has dated, and it doubles Sprite progress, not pass levels. The November 12 Gold Sprite adds bonus XP for eliminations, though Epic doesn’t say whether that counts toward the pass. Steady sessions beat a late sprint.
What happens to unclaimed rewards
Claim everything you’ve earned in the pass tab before the timer runs out. Epic Player Support has been quoted as saying earned rewards arrive automatically at your next login after a season ends, but other pages say unclaimed tiers don’t carry over, so claiming early is the safe move. Either way, a reward on a level you never reached isn’t yours to claim.
Override shows how long a missed outfit stays gone. Its pass expired on November 1, 2026, so none of its cosmetics can return to the Item Shop before about May 2028, and some may never leave the pass. For the outfits players chase hardest, PlayerBay’s rundown of the most expensive Fortnite skins in 2026 covers the limited promos, controller bundles and rarely seen skins at the top.
Before the reported December 5 end event
- Claim your rewards early. Open the pass tab and claim everything you’ve earned, then check again in the final week.
- Don’t count on a pass XP event. Epic hasn’t announced one for Treasure Hunters, and the XP needed per level isn’t confirmed for this pass.
- OG Pass: separate timer. See the Fortnite OG section below.
- Watch Epic’s status page. Epic posted the v43.00 downtime notice there about 31 hours before servers went down, so expect a similar heads-up.
What past season-change downtime tells you
Epic hasn’t posted any downtime for December 5. As of November 2, 2026, its status page shows no December maintenance at all. Last year’s finale is the closest guide: after the Zero Hour live event on November 29, 2025, the game went into downtime right away. If the December 5 event plays out the same way, expect servers to go down as soon as it ends.
Epic’s own status log shows how long recent changeovers took:
- v43.00, November 1, 2026 (Override to Treasure Hunters): 05:00 to 08:12 UTC, about 3 hours 12 minutes.
- v42.00, August 20, 2026 (Runners to Override): 06:00 to 11:31 UTC, about 5 hours 31 minutes.
- Regular patches, July to October 2026: about 1 hour 53 minutes to 2 hours 44 minutes, usually Thursdays at 08:00 UTC.
For v43.00, matchmaking switched off 30 minutes before the servers went down, and Epic posted the notice late on October 30, about 31 hours before downtime. Keep an eye on Epic’s Fortnite status page in the days before December 5 for the same kind of notice.
How Fortnite seasons last
| Season | Ran | Days | How it ended |
|---|---|---|---|
| Simpsons mini-season | November 1 to November 29, 2025 | 28 | Zero Hour live event, then downtime |
| Chapter 7 Season 1 (Pacific Break) | November 29, 2025 to March 19, 2026 | about 110 | Season 2 launch |
| Chapter 7 Season 2 | March 19 to June 5, 2026 | about 78 | Shattered event |
| Chapter 7 Season 3 (Runners) | June 6 to August 20, 2026 | about 75 | v42.00 update, about 5.5 hours offline |
| Chapter 7 Season 4 (Override) | August 20 to November 1, 2026 | 73 | v43.00 update, about 3.2 hours offline |
| Treasure Hunters | November 1, 2026 to the reported December 5 end event | about 34 if that holds | End time not confirmed |
Treasure Hunters is by far the shortest stretch of Chapter 7: even Override, the briefest full season, lasted more than twice as long. Last year had the same shape. A mini-season started on November 1, 2025, right after the fall season, and Chapter 7 launched on November 29, straight after the Simpsons run ended.
If that repeats, a new chapter close to the end event is a fair bet. It’s a guess built on one previous year, though, and at about 34 days this mini-season would run a week past the Simpsons one.
Chapter 8: expected, not confirmed yet
What’s confirmed: Epic hasn’t announced a Chapter 8 date. Epic says its developer roadmap now lives on the Epic Developer Community, so that and Epic’s news posts are where an official date would show up.
What’s expected: Reports range from late November to mid-December, and Epic hasn’t announced any of them. Some point to November 28, citing Epic’s older creator roadmap. Others point to Saturday, December 5, the same day as the reported end event. December 10 appears too, though pages disagree on whether that’s the Chapter 8 launch or its first patch.
Until Epic posts a date, plan your session around the end event, not a chapter launch. Recheck in late November.
Fortnite OG runs on its own calendar
Fortnite OG’s latest season, Chapter 1 Season X, started September 3, 2026 with v42.10 and has its own OG Pass; Epic hasn’t announced an end. The OG island kept running through the changeover: Epic’s OG v43.00 notes brought Starry Suburbs and Greasy Grove back on November 1.
Some pages list December 4, 2026 as the Season X end, but Epic hasn’t confirmed it, so look at the OG Pass in game rather than assuming it finishes with Treasure Hunters.
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