Shadowlands will no longer release on October 27th. The pre-patch however is almost upon us…

Delay

Blizzard gave this statement last evening:

To the WoW community,

I wanted to let you know that we’re delaying the release of Shadowlands to later this year—and while we’re still in the process of determining the right new date to launch, we felt it was important to let you know about this change in plans as soon as we could. This was an incredibly difficult decision for the team, as we’re as eager to get the expansion into your hands as you are to play it—but ultimately, we feel it’s the right decision for the game—and for our players.

Over the past several months of testing, we’ve made significant progress iterating on and polishing the core features and gameplay of Shadowlands. We’re at a point where the zones, the campaign, the level-up questing experience, and the story we have to tell are essentially ready to share. We’re excited by the Covenants at the heart of the expansion, and it’s been a thrill to see Torghast take shape into a fun new kind of WoW experience, thanks in no small part to your input.

However, as everything started coming together and we’ve been listening to and building upon your feedback, it’s become clear we need a little more time for additional polish, and to balance and iterate on some interlocking pieces—particularly those related to the endgame. Shadowlands is one of the most intricate expansions we’ve yet created, and while we’ve made great progress, the challenge of tuning the endgame was compounded by the team having to work from home.

Blizzard has a commitment to quality. We believe Shadowlands will be something special, and we’ve heard from many of you who feel the same. We need this extra time to ensure that Shadowlands lives up to its full potential.

In the meantime, we’re excited to announce that beginning October 13 we will be releasing the Shadowlands pre-patch, which lays a lot of the groundwork for the expansion and includes our revamped character leveling, new-player experience on Exile’s Reach, and a host of new character customization options. And once we get closer to Shadowlands’ release, you’ll be called upon to defend Azeroth against a resurgence of the Scourge during our pre-launch event.

Thanks for your support and passion, and for your continued help and feedback as we head toward the finish line.

We’ll see you in the Shadowlands soon,
John Hight, Executive Producer of World of Warcraft

So we got no new release date yet and we only know that it will release this year.

State of the game

I played the Beta myself and the game is not in a release state yet. Sets are missing, there are still leveling issues, Performance is bad, Some maps are low quality and there are still some balance issues. So i think it is a good call to delay Shadowlands to avoid another BFA/WOD expansion were the concept was great but had many flaws in the end.

Pre-Patch

The pre patch will release on October 13’th in the US so it will be the 14th for the EU. Here is a list of what the pre patch will bring:

• New menu screen
• New character customization options
• New starting zone for first 10 levels
• Level squish (your level 120 will be level 50 in pre patch)
• Leveling revamp
• Corruption is gone
• Zombie Invasion (like in the Lich King pre patch)
• New talents and spells
• Pre patch questline and item sets
• BFA season 4 ended so no more curve

How long the pre patch will be and in what pace in unknown at this moment. But we will have more to do then we did in the Battle for Azeroth pre patch. And if you are done with all the content you can level a new alt with the new leveling experience.