Fortnite's Lantern Fest 2026 event introduced a new team size to Reload — Teams of 8 —, and it has immediately confused a large portion of the player base. The mode launched on February 19, 2026, and runs through February 25, 2026, at 9 a.m. ET. During this window, Teams of 8 is the only casual Reload playlist available. Solos, duos, and standard squads have all been removed from the unranked Reload menu.
Quick answer: Teams of 8 does not place all eight players in a single visible squad. Instead, your team of eight is split into two groups of four. You can directly communicate with and see the health bars of your own squad of four, while the other four allied players appear on the minimap with white arrow icons similar to hired NPCs.
How Teams of 8 actually splits your squad
The name "Teams of 8" suggests you'll drop in with seven teammates in one unified group. In practice, the mode pairs two separate squads of four players together into a single allied team. Your primary squad of four works like a normal Reload squad — you share voice chat, see each other's health and shield bars, and can revive one another as usual.
The second squad of four on your team is marked with white arrow icons above their heads, much like the indicators you'd see over hired NPC allies. You cannot damage these players, and you can revive them, but you won't see their health or shield status. They also don't appear on the full map if they land far away from you. Healing items like Fizz, Shield Kegs, and Med Mist Grenades from the other half of your team won't affect you either, which has led many players to assume the system is bugged.
The maximum party size you can bring into the mode is four. If you queue with friends, you can invite up to three of them, and the remaining four slots on your team are filled with random players who form the second allied squad. There is no way to queue as a full group of eight friends.
Casual Reload playlist restrictions during Lantern Fest
For the duration of the event, Teams of 8 completely replaces all other casual Reload playlists. Solo, duo, and squad options are not selectable in unranked Reload. The fill toggle is also locked — you cannot turn off auto-fill, meaning the game will always attempt to assign you random teammates.
If you want to play Reload with a different team size, your only option is Ranked Reload. In Ranked, you can still adjust party size and choose between solos, duos, and squads. However, the Teams of 8 format is not available in Ranked, so the two modes are effectively mutually exclusive. This also means players working on Reload-specific quests — like top-10 finishes across all three maps for the color bars wrap — are funneled into either the chaotic 8-player casual mode or the higher-stakes Ranked environment.
Gameplay issues players are running into
The mode has drawn significant criticism in its first day. Several recurring problems stand out.
Reboot times are extremely long. With so many players alive on the map at once, reboot timers can stretch past 40 seconds. By the time reboots finally stop near the end of a match, more than 30 players may still be in the game, making late-game fights feel overwhelming.
Rebooting players get eliminated quickly. Because of the high player density on Reload's smaller maps, gliding back in after a reboot leaves you exposed to fire from multiple teams simultaneously. There's very little safe space to land.
Team coordination is poor. Since the two halves of your eight-player team have limited UI integration, teammates frequently scatter across the map. You may find yourself in a 1v4 fight while your allied squad is on the other side of the zone. The lack of shared health bars and limited map visibility for the second squad makes it difficult to know how many of your eight teammates are still alive at any given moment.
Players leave early. Despite Reload's core mechanic of rebooting eliminated teammates, many fill players quit after their first death, leaving remaining squad members at a severe disadvantage.
Comparison to previous large-team experiments
Epic has tested larger team sizes in Reload before. Quints, which allowed five-player squads, was added as an additional option alongside existing playlists. Players who didn't enjoy Quints could simply ignore it and queue into solos, duos, or squads as usual. The key difference with Teams of 8 is that it replaces every other casual option rather than supplementing them, which has frustrated players who prefer smaller team sizes or solo play.
What you can do until the event ends
The Lantern Fest event — and with it, the Teams of 8 lock on casual Reload — is scheduled to end on February 25, 2026, at 9 a.m. ET. Until then, your options are straightforward. If you want to play casual Reload, Teams of 8 is the only choice. If you want solo, duo, or squad Reload, switch to Ranked. And if neither appeals to you, standard Battle Royale playlists remain unaffected.
For players grinding event-specific rewards like emoticons and sprays tied to the Lantern Fest, you'll need to play through Teams of 8 to earn them. The mode does offer solid XP payouts, particularly in early matches where stacked quests can yield over 100,000 XP in a single game — though that's more a function of quest completion than any inherent XP boost in the mode itself.