WoW Forever Name Reservation

WoW Forever name reservation and character creation dates

Reservation window

Oct 27 – Nov 3

2026; opens 1:00 p.m. PDT in North America, 18:00 CET in Europe

Characters

Up to 3

created and customized, not just names

Who can reserve

Any upgrade

Skyborne Heroic Pack and up

Names

First come, first served

no name is guaranteed

1. Oct 20, 2026

   Invite-A-Friend codes go out by email

   To the Battle.net email address of the account that bought an upgrade, one email per code.

2. Oct 23, 2026

   Beta ends

   Blizzard extended it to Oct 23, closing at 10:00 a.m. PDT (the roadmap graphic below showed Oct 22). It closes before the reservation window opens. The WoW Forever beta page counts down to it.

3. Oct 27 – Nov 3, 2026

   Early name reservation and character creation

   Up to 3 characters per upgraded account, first come, first served.

4. Nov 4, 2026

   Launch

   Wed, Nov 4, 3:00 PM PST, worldwide. Everyone with a subscription or Game Time can create characters from here.

5. Nov 4 – 11, 2026

   Invite-A-Friend week

   Invited friends play Forever without a subscription until Nov 11.

Who can reserve a name

Early Name Reservation is an upgrade perk, not part of the base game. Every Forever upgrade includes it, so the Skyborne Heroic Pack is the smallest purchase that does. Prices and everything else in each pack are on the release date page.

• Bound to one WoW account. The store fine print says the benefit only applies to the specific WoW account it was purchased for. If your Battle.net account holds more than one WoW account, buy the upgrade for the one you will play on.
• No guarantee. Blizzard says names are reserved first come, first served, and desired names cannot be guaranteed.
• Characters, not just names. Blizzard says you create and customize the characters themselves during the window, before launch.

Bought the physical Collector’s Edition?

This is the unclear case. The Blizzard Gear Store says the box isn’t available to ship until November 2026, so it is unlikely to arrive before the window closes on Nov 3, and the Warcraft Forever Collection inside it comes as a code in the box. The beta code and the 3 Invite-A-Friend codes are the parts that arrive by email soon after you order.

Two players on Blizzard’s forums posted the replies they got from Blizzard Support. One says Early Name Reservation, like the 30 days of Game Time and Warcraft III, can’t be used until the box arrives and its code is redeemed. The other, from a Game Master, says the box’s code has to be claimed before early naming can be used. Blizzard hasn’t announced this itself, so treat it as unconfirmed.

Blizzard’s own advice covers the gap. Blizzard Support says that to enjoy the digital rewards, including any available early access, before the box arrives, you can buy a digital edition on the Battle.net Shop; the Gear Store says the same. If you redeem the Collector’s Edition code before Dec 31, 2027, the digital purchase is credited as Battle.net Balance, but the Gear Store warns that not all products and upgrade paths qualify and some credits need Customer Support. An upgrade bought on top of it (Heroic to Epic, for example) isn’t credited automatically; Customer Support handles those.

First and last names: how WoW Forever names work

• Two names per character. Characters use two-part names, like a first and a last name. Blizzard’s example on the Deep Dive panel was “Ana Forever”.
• Both names are required. In the September 17 Live Q&A, Blizzard said the last name field has to be filled in. Wowhead had already reported that both the main and the secondary name are chosen at character creation.
• Unique per region, not per realm. Forever has no realms, so a name is unique across your whole region — Blizzard said so on the Deep Dive panel and again in the September 17 Live Q&A. On the panel it said the second name is there so you can still make original names at that scale. How rulesets replace realms is on the WoW Forever servers page.
• One full name per region, across every ruleset. In the September 17 Live Q&A, Blizzard said the same full name can’t be used again on a different ruleset. Its reasoning was that rulesets put far more players in one pool and the full name is what identifies a character.
• You can hide your second name. Blizzard’s naming article: Game Menu (Escape), Options, Nameplates, then “My Secondary Name”. It stops showing in the world but still shows in chat. Icy Veins says a toggle also hides everyone else’s.
• Both parts are checked together. Blizzard says the name filter reads the full name, so splitting a restricted word across the two parts won’t necessarily get through. If your pick is taken or refused, the in-game random name generator is still there.
• What counts as taken. Only the full name. Warcraft Tavern’s write-up of the September 17 Live Q&A says the developers confirmed that several players can share a first name or a last name, just not both, which matches Blizzard calling the full name the unique identifier.
• Restricted names: Blizzard said a bug was blocking some names too broadly, including names containing “c-o-n”. It said a fix would arrive with the next realm restart in each region; if a name was rejected, try again after that restart.
• Names are checked in the beta. On September 24 Blizzard forced name changes on beta characters that broke its naming policy and took beta access from some players, with no appeal through Customer Service, and said an automatic name check would follow.
• Not announced yet: length limits, which letters and accents are allowed, and whether you can change a name later.

Before the window opens: a name reservation checklist

• Check the account. Make sure the upgrade is on the WoW account you will play Forever on; the reservation doesn’t carry to your other accounts.
• Pick the full name and backups. Both parts are required, and anyone else with an upgrade is reserving at the same time. Keep a second and third choice ready.
• Agree on a ruleset and faction first. You pick a ruleset (Normal, PvP, Roleplay or RP-PvP at launch) instead of a realm, and you can only group with players on the same ruleset and faction. In the September 17 Live Q&A, Blizzard said that without a character transfer you cannot move between rulesets, and that the same full name cannot be claimed again on a different one. It did not say whether transfers will be offered.
• Skyborne is covered. The Skyborne race and the Zephras Isle start need the Heroic Pack or higher, and every edition that includes name reservation already unlocks them. Blizzard hasn’t announced any race or class limits for the window.
• Watch for the start time. Blizzard gives Oct 27 and Nov 3 in PST but no hour, so check the Battle.net app and Blizzard’s news when the window gets close.

WoW Forever Invite-A-Friend codes

The same upgrades come with Invite-A-Friend Launch Codes: a friend who redeems one plays Forever free during launch week. These are the rules from Blizzard Support’s Invite-A-Friend article.

The start of delivery is unclear: Blizzard Support says emails start on Oct 20, while the official Warcraft account said on Oct 28 that Heroic and Epic owners would start receiving codes that day. Check your Battle.net email and spam folder; Blizzard has not explained the difference.

• What your friend gets: free access to Forever on the account that redeems the code, from launch on Nov 4 through Nov 11, 2026. It is not Game Time, doesn’t open any other version of WoW, and doesn’t include the Skyborne race or its starting quests.
• Redeeming: on Battle.net or in the Battle.net app until Nov 11. A code works on one WoW account, and not on an account that bought any Forever upgrade.
• No codes for gift purchases, or for Collector’s Editions bought from local retailers in Korea, Australia and New Zealand. Codes stop working if the order is refunded or charged back.
• Lost or used on the wrong account: Blizzard Support won’t replace the code.