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Fortnite seasonal events

Fortnite is a free-to-play video game platform developed by Epic Games. Fortnite originally was developed as the cooperative player-versus-environment survival game, ', released in July 2017. The game's development shifted significantly following the beta release of the Fortnite Battle Royale in September 2017, a battle royale game where 100 players compete to be the last player standing. After dropping from an airborne Battle Bus onto an island featuring several points of interests (POIs), players gather various weapons and gear. During a round of gameplay, a harmful storm front periodically shrinks while moving across the map, drawing players into smaller areas on the island.

This new mode proved exceptionally popular, drawing large numbers of players. With Fortnite Battle Royales success, Epic expanded the Fortnite platform to include other games and user-created modes built atop the Unreal Engine and the Unreal Editor for Fortnite (UEFN) system.

Since December 2017, Fortnite has included seasonal content purchasable via the battle pass, with various cosmetic rewards. Each season lasts for two to three months. Starting towards the end of the third season in April 2018, Epic began introducing a narrative structure to their seasons, to explain changes to the island and to introduce new licensed cosmetic items. Fortnite has conducted continuous collaborations, such as with Disney, Marvel, and Star Wars themed seasons.

By 2025, the Fortnite platform supported the Epic-developed games Fortnite Battle Royale, Fortnite: Save the World, Lego Fortnite, Fortnite Festival, Rocket Racing, and Fortnite Ballistic, along with user-created games in Fortnite Creative and Fall Guys.

Background

To monetize the game, Epic Games had built an in-game storefront to offer cosmetics in the form of character skins, emotes, and other customization items for the player to use with their game avatar for Fortnite Battle Royale, using "V-Bucks" as the form of in-game currency to make these purchases. In December 2017, Epic Games introduced a purchasable battle pass that featured numerous customization items earnable through gameplay, along with V-Bucks. The battle passes are time-limited and can only be completed during the current Chapter, typically over three to four months, with Chapter 1 representing all content from September 2017 to the launch of the Chapter and battle pass system in December 2017.

Initially, each Chapter brought about changes to the layout of the island. With the launch of Season 4 in May 2018, Epic Games used a series of in-game events to tease a narrative structure that would be used for all future seasons, and used further in-game events to explain changes to the island's map. Chief creative officer Donald Mustard explained that the idea of including narrative had been part of the concept of Fornite Battle Royale from the start, but because the game is primarily a multiplayer game, determining how to introduce story element had been difficult. Epic found that driving toward large, end-of-chapter events would lead to changes in the island in the next season.

Prior to the start of Chapter 2 in October 2019, Epic also introduced character skins and cosmetics based on licensed characters. Since then, Epic has broken the storyline into Chapters grouping several seasons, with each season adding further crossover content from other licensed properties.

Seasonal content

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Special events

Non-gameplay related promotional events have included:

  • EDM artist Marshmello held a virtual concert in the Pleasant Park location on February 2, 2019, across all game servers, estimated to have had over 10 million players watching it live.
  • On December 14, a special preview of ' (2019) was released at the Risky Reels location, hosted by Geoff Keighley, with a special guest appearance by director J. J. Abrams, along with Ben Schwartz as FN-143, a Stormtrooper from the First Order, which also featured the character of Emperor Palpatine in a voice segment that was referred to in the film's opening crawl, which marked the start of the Star Wars collaboration event.
  • Travis Scott performed a virtual "Astronomical" tour in support of his 2018 album Astroworld within Fortnite on multiple live concerts between April 23 and 25, 2020, including the premiere of a new song, "The Scotts", featuring Kid Cudi, who is one-half of the super-duo of the same name. The first performance on April 23 was estimated to have drawn over 12.3 million players to watch, while a total of 27.7 million unique viewers cumulatively watched the concerts. Along with these concerts, the event included new cosmetics based on Scott for in-game purchase. Scott also released Fortnite-inspired Cactus Jack products such as action figures and lunchboxes for the event.
  • Diplo performed a live Major Lazer concert along with Jordan Fisher in the new "Party Royale" game mode on May 1, 2020, to test out that mode, while a multi-part concert by Dillon Francis, Steve Aoki, and Deadmau5 was held on May 8 to celebrate the full release of the "Party Royale" game mode.
  • A trailer for Christopher Nolan's Tenet (2020) was first shown in the "Party Royale" game mode before releasing to other digital services on May 21, 2020. In June 2020, Fortnite announced that it would livestream one of three Nolan films, Inception, Batman Begins, and The Prestige, depending on the region, through its "Movie Nite" event within "Party Royale". Epic Games partnered with Nolan and Warner Bros. to secure distribution rights in different languages and countries.
  • BTS premiered their dance choreography music video for "Dynamite" in the "Party Royale" game mode on September 22, 2020. It also featured the Tropical Remix version of the song.
  • J Balvin performed a live concert in the "Party Royale" game mode on October 31, 2020, premiering a new song titled "La Luz". Anyone who attended the concert could get a special J Balvin style for the Party Trooper outfit. The concert was recorded using extended reality (XR) technology.
  • Epic launched a short animated film festival within the "Party Royale" mode in February 2021, called "Short Nite". It would later return in July 2021, then later as Creative experiences for both the entire festival and the individual short films in October 2021 as "Shortnitemares" and May 2022 during a limited time window for the latter two.
  • Ariana Grande performed virtually as the headline act of the "Rift Tour" in August 2021.
  • The Kid Laroi performed virtually at his concert "Wild Dreams" as a Creative experience in January 2023 during a limited time window.
  • Metallica performed at their virtual concert "Fuel. Fire. Fury." as an UEFN experience on June 22 and 23, 2024, during six limited-time windows over the course of the two days, with a special "encore" showing from August 2 to 5. In addition to the concert, Metallica music and themed cosmetics were added across Battle Royale, Fortnite Festival, Rocket Racing and Lego Fortnite; a Metallica-themed weapon inspired by "Ride the Lightning" and a location based on the M72 World Tour were added to Battle Royale for a limited time.
  • Disney livestreamed a segment of the 2024 D23 Entertainment Showcase in-game as a UEFN experience to announce upcoming collaborative content with Epic Games for Fortnite, which included the Marvel-themed "Absolute Doom" season for Battle Royale in addition to numerous other cosmetics from various Disney intellectual properties. According to Disney, 1.2 million players watched the event live. Those who attended received a Peelverine plush as an in-game cosmetic for free.
  • Karol G performed in the "Karol G: MSB Fortnite" UEFN experience in August 2024, to promote the album Mañana Será Bonito and the Bichota Season mixtape. Those who attended received a Karol G-themed bass guitar for Fortnite Festival.
  • The "Chapter 2 Remix" season in November 2024 kicked off with a live performance from Snoop Dogg and Ice Spice in New York City's Times Square inside the TSX Stage, which was simultaneously broadcast in Battle Royale and Zero Build. Eminem, who previously appeared as the headline act for the "Big Bang" event, along with Juice Wrld, joined Snoop Dogg and Ice Spice for the season's concert finale event at the end of the month. All four rappers were prominently featured throughout the season.
  • The "Daft Punk Experience" launched In September 2025. Billed as the biggest Fortnite musical event so far, it was made in collaboration with Daft Life. The introductory sequence to the event, set to Daft Punk's 2013 song Contact was created by Epic Games and Magnopus in collaboration with Daft Punk's creative director Cédric Hervet; an official music video for "Contact" was released in November 2025 incorporating the visuals from this introductory sequence.
  • With the launch of Chapter 7 in late November 2025, Epic Games and director Quentin Tarantino worked together to create , an eight-minute animated short film based on a cut scene from Tarantino's film . The short, which was animated in Unreal Engine using Fortnite character models, sees Gogo Yubari's sister Yuki hunting down the Bride as revenger for her sister's death, with Uma Thurman reprising her role via motion capture technology. The short film first premiered at a special event held by Epic Games at the Vista Theater in Los Angeles on November 19. It was then released to the public via an in-game event on November 30.

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