04 | February | 2026 | The Ancient Gaming Noob

Over the next three expansions, we’re going all in on Theatres of War, expanding Factional Warfare and formalizing Military Campaigns as a core part of EVE’s future

-CCP Director’s Letter

Last week I did a round up of 2026 roadmaps, but EVE Online hadn’t posted one yet. So I substituted in a mock up that somebody did on Reddit back when the 2025 roadmap dropped.

EVE Online 2026 Roadmap Prediction

With that on the line, CCP then decided to post their 2026 roadmap yesterday, because that is always the way these things work out. So how do the two roadmaps match up?

The EVE Online 2026 Roadmap

First off, it is tiny. If you strip off the boarder fluff, as I did, it is only about 800×330 pixels.

Is there nobody in the are department that could get them a 1920×1080 version to post? Are they afraid that we’ll be able to read it or something? Or is the community team concerned about using up drive space for the web site? Seriously, go HD size or go home man.

Anyway, almost everything listed on the Reddit mock-up aligns with something on the actual 2026 roadmap.

So, for Q1 we do have an update to Catalyst, the most recent expansion, Q2 lines up 100% with Fanfest, Capsuleer Day, and the Q2 (no longer summer) expansion. Q3 has the alliance tournament feeders, but lacks the expected update (read “finish”) the Q2 expansion entry, and Q4 lines up exactly with the Q4 expansion, the alliance tournament, Crimson Harvest and the Winter Nexus.

So the prediction was 9 for 10 on items it showed, with one being omitted.

But there are 15 items on the actual 2026 roadmap, so what are the 6 new and/or unexpected items? Well, only four of them are related to EVE Online.

For Q1 2026, in addition the the update to Catalyst we have:

EVE Evolved
Gallente Election

As explained in the post accompanying the roadmap, EVE Evolved are points where we will see graphical updates to the game outside of the normal expansion cycle. Those are generally good and the art team has rarely let us down. I still miss the old Cormorant model and I am still adapting to the new Scythe/Scimitar model, but the game looks better and better as the years go on.

Meanwhile the Gallente Election… looks to be an in-game lore event, possibly connected to Faction Warfare? [Edit: Lore link from the comments.] One of the big statements in the post, which I quoted at the top of the post, is that CCP will be focused on Faction Warfare for the next three expansions. They are going to make low sec work no matter how long it takes!

For Q2 2026 the only change is calling the expansion the Q2 Expansion and not the Summer Expansion, probably so pedants like me will stop pointing out “well akshully summer in the northern hemisphere starts at the summer solstice,” and honestly I can respect that.

When we come to Q3 we have another EVE Evolved update, so more better graphics as the new entry for EVE Online. and then the CSM Elections, something not mentioned in 2025. We’ll get to the other entry on its own.

EVE Evolved
CSM Elections

And when we arrive at Q4 the EVE Online entries are the same, the alliance tournament, and expansion, and the two usual events.

So 4 of the 6 new items are two graphical updates and two elections, one Gallente and one for the CSM. We’ll see what the former ends up being, but I recall some lore item about the current Gallente president being in trouble. Or maybe I dreamt it.

Which leaves the two other items, both related to EVE Vanguard. Those are two events related to CCP’s desperate desire to make an FPS game like the other cool kids… which trying to tie it into EVE Online, something that worked out so well last time.

As part of that we got this tidbit:

EVE Vanguard’s Steam Early Access release is moving beyond Summer 2026

So it is being pushed out again. Will that been autumn or winter for early access? We shall see.

In summary the roadmap and supporting post says:

Faction Warfare is all the game designers are focused on
The art team is still there for us
Otherwise, business as usual for New Eden events

There is also an accompanying video of CCP Rattati, CCP Burger, and CCP Okami talking about all of this.

I was going to listen to that but then they started off in the usual style of non-stop self-congratulation and… I’m just tired of that routine. So maybe there was some useful information in the video, or maybe it just the usual patting themselves on the back before diving into the shooter game they would apparently much rather have than EVE Online. I’ll never know because I don’t have the patience for it anymore.

And so it goes in New Eden.