Rust's Naval Update Slips to February 2026 — and Why That's the Right Call
Facepunch delayed the naval update to February 5, 2026 to protect holiday-peak server stability. Here's the reasoning, plus the Christmas update and staging branch you get in the meantime.
Key takeaways
- Naval update moved to February 5, 2026 for stability
- A no-wipe Christmas update lands December 18, 2025
- Naval features are testable now on the staging branch
- The delay protects wipe-day server health during peak player counts
The naval update isn't coming in December. Facepunch pushed it to February 5, 2026 — and after reading the reasoning, it's hard to argue.
Why it slipped
In a blunt post, COO Alistair admitted the team bit off more than it could chew. The naval update rewires a lot of existing systems and adds new ones, and as the date closed in, the risk of shipping something that tanked server performance kept growing — right as the holiday player peak hits. Facepunch chose stability over hitting a date. For a game whose reputation lives and dies on wipe-day server health, that's the correct trade.
What you get before February
- Christmas update — December 18, 2025. It folds in some of what was meant for naval, and it does not require a wipe, so you keep your progress.
- Staging branch. If you can't wait, the naval features are testable on Rust's staging branch right now — buggy and unstable, but real, and the feedback you leave there genuinely feeds the final build.
What it means for you
Nothing breaks in the short term, and you get holiday content without losing a base. Longer term, a naval update that launches stable is worth far more than one that launches on time and stutters through the busiest week of the year. Use the runway: if water combat and boats interest you, hop on staging and start working out how naval changes territory control before everyone else does.
Source: Facepunch devblog — Getting It Right.