Diablo 4 Season 4 release date, PTR & everything we know so far

Season 4 of Diablo 4 is next up, and expectations are tentatively high. Diablo 4 has started to develop a pattern where the odd-numbered seasons are looked on less favourably than the even-numbered ones.

While Season 4 will only be the second even-numbered season added to the game, players are hoping it will have a similar effect to Season 2 and bring some much-needed changes. That already seems like it might be the case, so here's what we know so far.

Diablo 4 Season 4 will begin on May 14, 2024, the same day that Season 3 ends. The season was originally slated to kick off in April, but had to be delayed for updates to be applied. Season 3 has been extended until that date, so players will have more time to prepare.

Unless there's any other delay, the new season should kick off on the 14th of May at 10 AM PT, 1 PM ET, 6 PM GMT. You won't have to wait that long to check out some of the changes coming in Season 4, either, as a PTR will take place ahead of time.

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According to a recent Campfire Chat, the PTR (Public Test Realm) for Season 4 will run from April 2nd to April 9th. Players will get to try the new changes before they go live in the game proper, giving Blizzard a chance to make any necessary changes before the official launch.

This is also the reason for the delay in Season 4, to give the developers time between the PTR and the launch to make any necessary changes. The PTR will only be available through Battle.net, so only PC players using the service will get the opportunity to check it out.

Do we know what's coming in the next season?

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The thematic content of Season 4 is still unknown, and with the delay, it may be a while before we know more. However, the big story for Season 4 has been and continues to be the system changes coming to the game.

For example, a key concern among Diablo 4's player base for some time now has been the sheer number of item drops and the usefulness of those items. Blizzard has shared details on how it plans to deal with this in Season 4 by reducing the number of items dropped from enemies, while increasing the power of said items to make them more useful.

A big part of this will be the changes made to affixes. The overall number of affixes will be reduced, removing many of the esoteric and fringe use-case ones and adding those with more potent abilities. Further, players will be able to customise items more freely by acquiring Tempering Manuals that can be used to apply affixes to items. Each manual applies a specific affix, and each one can be used indefinitely.

New Greater Affixes are being added to high-level items, which are significantly more powerful and will give endgame players something new to chase and add to their builds. Masterworking is a late-game upgrade system that will allow players to further improve the affixes of their items up to 12 times, with significant stat increases on the fourth, eighth, and twelfth masterwork.

Lastly, making life easier, the Codex of Power is getting a long-awaited update. Instead of only being able to pull a minimum roll of an aspect from the codex, when you salvage an item with a higher quality of an aspect you already have, the aspect in your codex will permanently improve to that level. This will make the Codex of Power incredibly useful, where it previously became irrelevant as you got to higher levels.

These are just some of the more significant changes of the many updates coming in Season 4, all of which we can test out when the PTR rolls out in early April. For more, head to our Diablo homepage where we have guides on the Malphas boss fight, farming Igneous Cores, Lunar Shrines, the best Seneschal construct build, and Uber unique crafting.