Fortnite Chapter 7 release timing and Zero Hour event schedule

Fortnite is about to move from Chapter 6’s Simpsons mini-season into Chapter 7, with a live event as the handoff and a new map on the other side. The important dates are clustered around the last weekend of November 2025, with some disagreement on the exact moment the new chapter becomes playable.

Fortnite Chapter 7 key dates and times

Several timelines are in play around the end of Chapter 6 and the start of Chapter 7 Season 1:

The only truly fixed times right now are for the Zero Hour finale playlist queues and the in-event start time on November 29. Chapter 7’s playable launch then lands either late on November 29 or on November 30, depending on which leak you trust and which time zone you’re in, with several hours of downtime in between.

Zero Hour live event and how it connects to Chapter 7

Zero Hour is the final Chapter 6 event, staged on the Simpsons mini-season map. A countdown timer currently hangs over Springfield’s town square, ticking toward November 29 at 11 AM PT / 2 PM ET. Epic’s trailer frames Zero Hour as a multiverse brawl: giant Homer Simpson, Godzilla, King Kong, and a stack of crossover characters sharing the same battlefield.

The event is described as an “interactive story experience” rather than a passive cinematic. It closes out Chapter 6 and is framed as the narrative bridge into Chapter 7 Season 1. Once Zero Hour ends, the battle royale mode is expected to go offline for maintenance while the existing map is removed and the new Chapter 7 island is staged.

Because the Simpsons mini-season is only about a month long, Zero Hour is also the last chance to play on Springfield before the map is retired. If you care about seeing that space in motion, the regional table above is the queue-up window to target.

When Fortnite Chapter 7 Season 1 is expected to start

There are two broad timelines being discussed for when you can actually drop into Chapter 7 matches:

• A November 29 start: Some coverage treats Chapter 7 as going live a few hours after Zero Hour, once a 3–5 hour downtime window ends. In that view, the chapter flips over on the same calendar day as the event for North American players.
• A November 30 start: Datamined schedule strings and internal season metadata consistently label “39.00” – the build associated with Chapter 7 Season 1 – with a November 30 date. Regional breakdowns list November 30 as the start date across PT, ET, GMT, and CET, rolling to December 1 in JST and AEST.

The Fortnite seasonal cadence over the last few years has favored overnight maintenance and a new chapter landing in the early morning hours relative to the event. The safest assumption is:

• Play Zero Hour during its listed times on November 29.
• Expect several hours where Battle Royale is offline afterward.
• Plan for Chapter 7 to be playable sometime on November 30 in the Americas and Europe, and on December 1 in East Asia and Australia, once servers come back up.

Exact hour-of-day for the Chapter 7 login queue remains unannounced; player-facing communication so far sticks to dates, not precise return times.

Internal Chapter 7 season details and map theme

Fortnite’s internal season listing for Chapter 7: Season 1 describes the season as “Season 39” with a main slogan of “Pacific Break” and a theme centered on the United States West Coast. The new island is named Hera Island, with an early named location called Sandy Strip.

Separate leak reporting converges on a Nevada and Hollywood blend for the map. That includes:

• A desert biome evoking Nevada.
• A massive urban city with LA or Hollywood-style skyline elements.
• POIs like a Hollywood Sign analogue, Area 51, and a Casino District.

The West Coast framing lines up cleanly with the “Pacific Break” slogan and the early Sandy Strip naming. The Simpsons mini-season map, centered on Springfield, is treated as a one-off; Hera Island represents the first completely new battle royale map since 2024.

Early access for content creators on November 19

Well before players see Hera Island, a small group of creators is scheduled to touch Chapter 7 early. A marketing teaser sent out for November 19 carries the line “// Now Playing, Zero Hour, Chapter Seven, Fortnite After Dark with Q & U, Early Access. One Night Only, 11.19.25” along with coordinates pointing at the Hollywood Sign.

The plan is for selected Epic-affiliated creators to attend a one-day, NDA-bound early access session on November 19. The stated goals are twofold:

• Gather structured gameplay feedback on the new map, mechanics, and loot pool before general release.
• Give creators enough footage and impressions to assemble launch-day videos and streams timed around Chapter 7’s debut.

This approach has already been used for the Simpsons mini-season and other limited-time modes. The difference here is that it applies to a full chapter refresh, raising ongoing debates inside the community about spoilers versus controlled marketing and whether pro players’ preferences should influence casual balance.

How long downtime between Zero Hour and Chapter 7?

Everything points to a relatively short downtime compared with historic black hole-style chapter transitions. Current expectations fall into two ranges:

• Roughly 3–5 hours in some leak rundowns, with Chapter 7 going live later in the same evening (ET) on November 29.
• “Around half a day” in other breakdowns, with server maintenance carrying through into November 30 before Hera Island unlocks.

In both cases, this is framed as routine maintenance, not a multi-day blackout. The launcher should continue to work, but Battle Royale queues will be blocked until the “39.00” build is fully rolled out and tested.

Tip: If you care about being among the first into Chapter 7, treat Zero Hour as the hard appointment and then monitor the in-game launcher messaging and official Fortnite social accounts afterward rather than leaving the game client idle.

How Chapter 7 fits Fortnite’s recent seasonal pattern

Chapter 6 launched in December 2024 and has experimented with shorter “mini seasons” on top of the standard multi-month arcs. The Simpsons crossover that currently occupies Chapter 6: Mini Season 2 is one of those experiments, condensing a full map makeover and battle pass into roughly four weeks.

Recent community discussion has focused on how that structure affects the traditional chapter “magic” – the sense of saying goodbye to a long-lived island in a dramatic finale and emerging somewhere entirely new. Chapter 7 is being treated as a reset button on that rhythm: a fresh map, a larger mechanical overhaul, and what looks like a pivot back toward Fortnite’s original storyline through The Seven, hinted at through the decision to consistently spell out “Chapter Seven” instead of using the numeral.

What remains stable is the anchoring to the end of the calendar year. Chapters have increasingly wrapped around November and December, and this transition fits that pattern, with Zero Hour closing out late November and the new map expected to carry Fortnite into 2026.

If you want to experience the transition in real time, the practical plan is simple: clear a slot for Zero Hour at the listed time on November 29 in your region, assume a several-hour maintenance window afterward, and expect Chapter 7 Season 1 to be accessible either late that same day or on November 30 once the servers reopen.