BlizzCon 2026, which is Blizzard's own convention for its games, now has a running order. The studio published the schedule, stream plan and rewards detail on 1 September, eleven days out from the show on 12 and 13 September at the Anaheim Convention Center. It says which parts are streamed for everyone at home, and it prints every start time twice, once in Pacific and once in UK time.

Three rows below are esports matches, and they come from two tournaments. The MDI, which stands for Mythic Dungeon Invitational, is the studio's dungeon competition. The AWC, the Arena World Championship, is its arena tournament. One panel on day two is about Hardcore, a mode where a character who dies is gone for good.

The World of Warcraft slots, both days

The Warcraft panels and three of the esports matches, taken from Blizzard's own longer list. Blizzard prints both clocks itself, so the UK column below is Blizzard's own, not a conversion of ours. BST is British Summer Time, the UK's summer clock. Every time is marked subject to change.

Four of these land after midnight in the UK. The UK is eight hours ahead of California, so a slot from about 4 p.m. Pacific onwards has already tipped into the next UK day. The dates in this table are ours too. Blizzard writes "day one" and "day two" and says the show runs on 12 and 13 September. Which day is which, and what weekday each one falls on, are our own reading of a calendar.

Our take: what it means for players

Two "What's Next" panels on the same afternoon is the shape worth reading. Our reading, and Blizzard has said none of this: one of those panels on its own is usually a year plan. Two back to back, with a cutscene panel wedged between them, looks like a roadmap split across a reveal and its detail. That is how we would pace an announcement we wanted to land twice.

The second signal is Hardcore getting its own forward-looking panel on day two, at 4:15 p.m. Pacific, rather than a mention inside a broader session. Our reading: a named "What's Next" slot is about the smallest promise a schedule can make to a mode, and it is still a promise. We will take it. A mode where death is permanent, given a stage of its own, is the genre remembering what it is good at.

The fine print is where our complaint sits, and Blizzard states it plainly. The streams cover the opening ceremony, major panels and esports competitions. The musical performances are not part of that, and neither are what Blizzard calls some other elements. Le Sserafim plays at 6:00 p.m. Pacific on day two and the trophy ceremony follows at 6:30 p.m. Pacific. Anyone attending in person has until 18 September to link a BlizzCon Pass, which is the in-person ticket, to a Battle.net account and still claim the rewards.

That deadline is the bit we think will cost somebody something. It is five days after the show closes, and Blizzard publishes it down inside a rewards section rather than up at the top. Our view: a paying attendee should not have to find a deadline in the small print to keep what they already bought. Say it louder, and say it early.

What's next

Blizzard says to check back after the opening ceremony for the fully updated schedule. Our expectation is that day two moves more than day one, because it has longer to move in. Both days, the two esports finals and the reward-linking deadline are on the calendar with the day we last checked each against Blizzard's page.