Fornite servers: are they down, status, when will update 22.10 be live in UK today - what have Epic Games said

Since Fortnite remains one of the world’s most popular games years after its initial release, any time it is taken offline, people notice.

The game often goes ‘down’ ahead of updates to Fortnite’s content, which are made fairly regularly, and their corresponding outages communicated well to players through social media channels.

The game is currently out of action, but while some downtime was expected ahead of Fortnite’s massive 22.10 update, the timing of it has taken fans a little by surprise.

So when can we expect to see the game up and running again?

Here is everything you need to know.

Is Fortnite down?

Yes. At the time of writing, online functionality for Fortnite is not working.

The game’s servers have been taken offline as the game is updated and maintained ahead of Fortnite’s big 22.10 patch, which is expected to bring a wealth of new content to the game.

This was all known to fans who’ve been keeping abreast of the latest information through the game’s social media accounts. The battle royale’s server outage was planned, but things haven’t gone as planned.

The maintenance period was scheduled to begin at 9am BST on 4 October. But instead, it started nearly 12 hours earlier, at 10pm on 3 October.

"Due to an issue, we are entering downtime early," @FortniteStatus tweeted. "Update 22.10 will still be released tomorrow October 4th."

Normally, we’d expect Fortnite server maintenance to last two - four hours, though downtime for major updates can last substantially longer. It’s unknown why Epic started this downtime earlier than expected.

When will Fortnite be back online?

Developers Epic Games haven’t specified how long Fortnite will be down, but did state that it will notify players when the outage is over.

Because the update is still scheduled for Tuesday 4 October, the maintenance may take until 5am in the early hours of Wednesday 5 October (midnight for Epic Games’ North Carolina headquarters).

Anyone attempting to log in now will see the notice: "You do not have permission to play Fortnite."

What’s new in 22.10?

The first major content drop of the season, Fortnite version 22.10, is likely to bring some interesting improvements.

According to respected Fortnite dataminers like Hypex, version 22.10 will remove Boogie Bombs from the game and return them to the vault.

And because the current season has a Chrome theme, viewers can expect the Chrome to extend and transform areas of the island. With the island shifting and evolving over the season, players might even receive some completely new areas of interest.

There is also speculation that the Fortnitemares Halloween event and potentially the next Star Wars cooperation will be added with the big update.

For the Fortnitemares event, gamers can expect new cosmetic items, Halloween-themed challenges, new game modes, and much more. Because the event is only a few weeks away, fans can expect a more in-depth look at the events shortly.