When is the Diablo 4 Battle Pass release date? The Diablo 4 Season 1 battle pass, and “Season Journey”, is an in-game rewards system that launches with the D4 Season on the Malignant. We first learned about it during a developer live stream, in which Blizzard shared what players could expect for battle passes in each season.
As we’ve come to expect from most live-service games now, Diablo 4 features a battle pass system with each of the D4 seasons, including various tiers, cosmetics for all of the Diablo 4 classes, opportunities for paid progression, and more. We’ve got everything you need to know about the Diablo 4 battle pass in season 1 below, but you might also want to check out our Diablo 4 review to see how good it is first.
Diablo 4 Battle Pass release date
The Diablo 4 Battle Pass release date is July 20, 2023, launching alongside the start of the Season of the Malignant. After that, we can expect the new seasons on a quarterly schedule.
How much will the Diablo 4 Battle Pass cost?
The Diablo 4 Battle pass will have a free and paid track of 27 and 63 tiers, respectively. You can expect to pay $10 (£8) for access to the Premium Battle Pass.
There is an option to purchase tier skips at an additional cost with the Accelerated tier, priced at $25 (£21), which also rewards you with an additional cosmetic. Each level costs 200 Platinum to skip. Players expect three months to complete the Battle Pass before each season ends.
Diablo 4 Battle Pass rewards
The Diablo 4 battle pass rewards confirmed so far are:
- Emblems
- Emotes
- Cosmetic items
- Titles
- Smoldering Ashes
You must earn Favor to level up your Battle Pass and earn these rewards. You can earn Favor in Diablo 4 by:
- Completing quests
- Killing enemies
- Completing events
- Completing seasonal objectives
- Completing Season Journey chapters
Diablo 4’s development team wants you to know, “You can’t pay for power in Diablo 4.” The developers reiterated this several times during the live stream while extrapolating on the mechanic that will prevent people from being able to pay to tier up their characters throughout the game. Players can expect to play for about 80 hours to level up the Battle Pass fully.
The team then explained that there will be two Battle Pass tiers: a free one, which consists of 27 tiers, and a premium Battle Pass, which consists of 63 tiers. This amounts to 90 tiers, and players will have about three months to complete the Battle Pass. The progression system is visualized at the bottom of the image below.
The free tier is open to all players who own the game, and they can earn rewards after reaching certain levels. The paid tier contains only cosmetics, which include two full armor sets, a seasonal mount, and mount armor. If you play the game and choose to purchase the Battle Pass later in the season, your progress toward the paid Battle Pass tier is retroactive, meaning you can gain all rewards you would have previously earned.
Players will still have the option to purchase Battle Pass tiers as part of an accelerated option. They will generally progress the battle pass by creating Favor, which they’ll get by performing activities throughout the game world as part of the Season Journey. Tied to the game’s seasonal content, the Season Journey is designed to help players level up their battle passes, regardless of whether they’re on the free or paid battle pass track.
Seasonal Blessings
One of the rewards above that can be earned through the free Battle Pass track is Smoldering Ashes, which in turn are used to earn Seasonal Blessings. You can choose which of the five Seasonal Blessings you wish to level up first, and each can be boosted to level four, their benefits increasing each time. The Season 1 Seasonal Blessings are:
- Urn of Aggression: boost XP from monster kills.
- Urn of Bargaining: boost Gold earned from vendor sales.
- Urn of Reclamation: boost the chance to earn rare materials from Diablo 4 salvage.
- Urn of Prolonging: boost duration of elixirs.
- Urn of Malignance: boost the chance of Malignant enemies dropping Malignant Hearts.
Diablo 4 Season Journey details
Progress through the Diablo 4 Battle Pass by completing objectives and chapters, working your way through your Season Journey to earn Favor, Legendary Aspects, and other rewards. Some challenges reward more Favor than others, and include such tasks as completing one of the many Diablo 4 dungeons, gathering resources, and collecting season-exclusive items.
The Season Journey is made up of seven chapters, and you must complete a set number of objectives to progress to the next chapter. While each objective rewards you with Favor to move you along your Battle Pass tiers, completing a chapter comes with its own unique rewards, including brand-new Legendary Aspects.
Diablo 4 Battle Pass format
Diablo 4 will continue the series’ seasonal format, which is ongoing in Diablo 2 and Diablo 3. However, the developers have been clear that the seasonal content will explore and open new storylines and quests that deviate from the main campaign content. Players should think of the seasonal content as separate experiences from the campaign, and can only be completed with a new character, in the “Seasonal Realm”. While the Battle Pass can be worked on by new or old players carrying out the campaign, earning favor through kills and quests, you cannot experience season-exclusive mechanics – in this case, Malignant foes – until after campaign completion.
That’s everything we know about the Diablo 4 Battle Pass, coming to the game on the heels of the game’s launch. If you want to know which builds are most powerful, check out our best Rogue, Barbarian, and Druid builds here, or just go straight to the source and find the best Diablo 4 builds according to Blizzard (and us).