Overwatch 2 will be down for more server maintenance tonight

Overwatch 2 sombra emp animation blizzard image
(Image credit: Blizzard Entertainment)

Update: Overwatch 2 is undergoing more server maintenance Friday night as Blizzard continues rolling out fixes for the game's ongoing launch issues.

As we've been reporting since Overwatch 2 launched this week, server issues have been keeping players from getting past the title screen for days, while an issue with account merging resulted in some players losing skins they'd purchased. Most recently, reports are circulating about an Overwatch 2 bug that randomly buys skins for players.

Despite some considerable improvements following maintenance on Thursday, some of these issues persist. Therefore, Blizzard is taking the Overwatch 2 servers offline once more Friday night at 6pm PDT / 9pm EDT for "further fixes." Servers are estimated to be offline for about an hour.

You can read Blizzard's most recent Overwatch 2 status update here.

Original story:

Overwatch 2 has been plagued with serious server issues since it launched this week, but Blizzard now says it has "a number of fixes" going live today.

If you've tried finding a match in the last couple of days, there's a good chance you're familiar with the issues with the Overwatch 2 servers hopefully being addressed today. A lot of people are being met with unreasonably long queues. My personal experience trying to play the game reflects a pretty common story: the game tells me there are literally tens of thousands of players ahead of me. Other players are being told there are '0 players ahead' of them but are still stuck in the queue. Then there's the 'Unexpected Server Error' causing crashes in and out of games. Some people are missing skins and other items after Overwatch 2 cross progression and account merging issues.

In a tweet shared Thursday, Blizzard says it's working on a few different solutions.

Twitch Drops

Overwatch 2 Kiriko twitch drops

(Image credit: Blizzard Entertainment)

Get these Twitch Drops for Overwatch 2 and bag yourself some Kiriko items, including a legendary skin

More information was shared in a post on the Blizzard forums. Specifically, servers were taken offline between 3pm and 4pm PDT (6pm and 7pm EDT) so that Blizzard could "address some bugs related to account merge, login, and the First Time User Experience."

Later on tonight, the Overwatch 2 servers will be offline once more from 6pm-9pm PDT / 9pm-12am EDT. Notably, that maintenance period will be used to implement "significant upgrades to our databases to address player queues."

It sounds like it's that second maintenance period that'll be more impactful to the biggest server issues Overwatch 2 players are facing, but it sounds like some bugs are being ironed out right now.

A DDoS attack on Blizzard is at least partly to blame for Overwatch 2's rocky launch. While we wait for smoother waters, here are some common Overwatch 2 error codes to familiarize yourself with so you can get back to playing as fast as possible.

Jordan Gerblick

After scoring a degree in English from ASU, I worked as a copy editor while freelancing for places like SFX Magazine, Screen Rant, Game Revolution, and MMORPG on the side. Now, as GamesRadar's west coast Staff Writer, I'm responsible for managing the site's western regional executive branch, AKA my apartment, and writing about whatever horror game I'm too afraid to finish.

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