What is the Fallout 5 release date? With Fallout interest soaring again thanks to the release of the Fallout TV series, the question of when we’ll see the next mainline game in the series is hotter than ever. It’s been a while since we witnessed the bombs drop and enjoyed our single-player sojourn through Fallout 4’s Boston, and it’s fair to say that few were left satisfied by Bethesda’s foray into multiplayer with Fallout 76.
Naturally, then, we’re itching for news of when we might see Fallout 5, and if the game’s heritage is anything to go by, a new entry in the series could very well be one of the best PC games ever. With Starfield now checked off the list and Elder Scrolls 6 on the way, hopefully Bethesda will have some Fallout 5 news soon. In the meantime, here’s everything we do know about the game, along with our own Fallout 5 wishlist.
Fallout 5 release date estimate
Fallout 5 is on its way, but Bethesda has confirmed that The Elder Scrolls 6 is first. With that still a few years off, it’s likely that the Fallout 5 release date won’t be until around 2030.
We have waited as long as a decade between entries to our favorite post-apocalyptic series in the past. Since Fallout 76 was announced two years on from Fallout 4 – the same gap between Fallout 3 and New Vegas – it looks likely that we will be waiting a long time for Fallout 5.
In an interview with IGN in 2021, Todd Howard confirmed that the Elder Scrolls 6 release date comes first. With that not expected until at least 2026 due to Bethesda’s previous focus on Starfield, 2030 looks like a reasonable expectation for our next adventure outside the vault.
Fallout 5 news
Speaking on the Xbox Two Podcast back in July 2025, Windows Central’s executive editor Jez Corden revealed that Fallout 5 has officially been greenlit. This report took place after the layoffs at Microsoft, with Corden implying the budget used to create the now defunct Bethesda MMO would be moved to fund the upcoming Fallout sequel.
“Do we want to sink a ton of money into getting this [the cancelled MMO] to a point where it can compete with the established players on the market, or do we want to allocate that investment towards making Fallout 5?” says Corden. “It was a case of trade-offs, and that the program to expand Fallout 5, and Fallout in general, that’s where they’ve decided to make the investments.”
Official Fallout 5 news is thin on the ground; the most recent news from the same IGN interview is that Bethesda has a “one-pager” on “what [they] want to do” with Fallout 5. Alas, there was nothing more that Howard could share.
We do know that Bethesda thinks carefully about adding multiplayer to each of its major releases. Speaking to Mashable in 2015, Howard said: “Believe it or not, every time we do a game, we design a multiplayer mode just to see what we could do.” Fallout was a purely single-player series before the release of Fallout 76, and that didn’t exactly go down well with fans, so expect Fallout 5 to feature a lot more single-player content than 76 when it does eventually release.
We also expect Fallout 5 to utilize a new engine; while Starfield is powered by Creation Engine 2, visually it already looked dated by the time the space game actually shipped. At the very worst, we assume the Creation Engine will receive a hefty upgrade by the time Fallout 5 ships.
Fallout 5 single-player
It looks like fans can relax about every upcoming Bethesda game being online-focused. In an interview with German games site GameStar, Todd Howard was asked if all future Bethesda games would incorporate multiplayer and responded: “For those games, we want to keep them as single-player. That is what our focus is going to be.”
While Howard goes on to say that there may be some social features or integrations they have yet to come up with, it sounds as if Fallout 5’s focus will be on the single-player experience.
Fallout 5 locations
Plenty of new Fallout 5 locations have been rumored, but we have nothing concrete yet. We have picked the Fallout 5 settings we would like to see already, but here are the most rumored locations currently buzzing around the internet.
New Orleans
Ever since a trademark application for ‘Fallout New Orleans’ was filed to the EU Intellectual Property Office in 2016, rumors of a Deep South addition to the series have been swirling. We have visited swampy environments before in Fallout 3’s DLC, Point Lookout, and Far Harbor in Fallout 4, so take this rumor with a pinch of salt.
Chicago
Trivia time: when have we visited Chicago in the Fallout series before? Ten of our most arbitrary points to you if you recall the intro to Fallout: Tactics. We may have only visited the home of Al Capone and deep-dish pizza briefly, but there’s a chance that it could be a Fallout 5 location. In New Vegas, ED-E hints at Enclave outposts in Chicago, after all.
Alaska
Another rumored destination that has appeared in the series already is Alaska. But that was just before the bombs dropped in the Great War of 2077. Operation: Anchorage, the first Fallout 3 DLC pack, is named after the greatest battle in the series’ alternative universe: the liberation of Anchorage, Alaska, from occupying Chinese troops. In the DLC, you travel back to 2076 via your Pip-Boy, but it would be great to trace the aftermath of this famous fight in Fallout 5.
California
Could Fallout 5 see a return to the original location? Both Fallout 1 and 2 were set in California, but the Fallout TV series has now taken us back to our roots, being set in LA. With the timeline of the Fallout series presumably taking place before Fallout 5 (Fallout 4 took place just a decade before the show), perhaps we’ll pick up in the same location.
Outside America
A Fallout game has never been set outside the US, but could Fallout 5 be the first? Maybe we’ll be venturing into Chinese or Russian territory to allow us to see the world-consuming conflict from the perspective of America’s biggest Fallout foes.
Equally, what about the European Commonwealth? Whether it is London, Berlin, Paris, or Rome, it is an enticing prospect to visit Europe after decades of struggles over resources and civil wars decimated the Union.
Fallout 5 gameplay
Despite our positive Fallout 4 review, the game was not universally acclaimed. Few Fallout fans would count it as the pinnacle of the post-apocalyptic series, perhaps due to the reduced roleplaying mechanics and disappointing graphics. When it comes to Fallout 5 gameplay, RPG devotees are hoping for more.
Without any details to work with, we can only guess as to how Fallout 5 will play. We expect to be exploring a rich, new, and desolate world, looting, and picking up quests that take us to other intriguing locales. Hopefully, we get a deeper roleplaying system where choices actually feel consequential. It would also be great to see expanded dialogue options; we’d have that at the expense of a voiced protagonist, which was introduced in Fallout 4.
Considering the amazing creations that were made in the previous game, perhaps Fallout 4’s settlements will return in the next Fallout game. Building bases added another wrinkle to scavenging as we kept our eyes peeled for two coffee cups to rub together to craft a posh new khazi. Bringing back materials from quests to expand and bolster our bases proved a compelling gameplay loop. Here’s hoping we see expanded settlement options in Fallout 5, although you can have that right now by taking advantage of the Fallout 4 mods and console commands.
Anything new in terms of Fallout 5 gameplay is anybody’s guess, but perhaps we will see a VR version of the game launched close to, or simultaneously with, the standard game. In Fallout 4’s case, we had to wait for a little over two years from the main game’s release before we could strap The Commonwealth to our skulls.
Check out our list of the best RPG games and games like Fallout if you’re looking to kill time until you can explore a new wasteland again. Otherwise, check out some Fallout 5 system requirements estimation over on PCGameBenchmark to see if your computer can run Fallout 5.