War Thunder: Guides, Reviews and Updates

This is the NextPlayWire hub for War Thunder. It gathers the facts — developer, genre, platforms, modes, business model, latest patch — from official sources, and links to everything we have written.

At a glance

▶ Watch: "Dancing on the Edge" — War Thunder official cinematic trailer

Developer: Gaijin Entertainment. Publisher: Gaijin Network Ltd. A free-to-play, cross-platform MMO military game covering aviation, armoured vehicles and naval craft from the early twentieth century to modern units, with over 3,000 vehicles and around 100 maps.

Vehicle categories: Aviation, Helicopters, Ground Vehicles, Bluewater Fleet and Coastal Fleet. Main PvP modes: Arcade, Realistic and Simulator Battles, plus the Assault PvE mode, event formats and singleplayer options.

Platforms and release (checked 3 September 2026)

Windows: 15 August 2013. macOS: 17 April 2014. Linux: 6 November 2014. PlayStation 4: from November 2013; Xbox One: 19 June 2018; PlayStation 5: 17 November 2020. Official 1.0 release: 21 December 2016.

Latest update (checked 3 September 2026)

Update 2.57.1.126, published 2 September 2026: a fix for radar-less AI anti-air intercepting bombs and missiles, a potential fix for terrain fall-through, and a rework of the Nuclear Escalation mode with new Battle Rating brackets and revised air defences.

Key facts

Nations and vehicle types

The Steam store lists starter packs for the United States, USSR, Germany, Japan, France, Britain, Italy, China and Sweden; Gaijin announced Israel as a further playable nation in October 2021.

Each nation has its own research tree across the vehicle categories, which is why our beginner's guide is emphatic about picking one nation and one vehicle type before spreading out.

Player base (checked 3 September 2026)

On the day we checked Steam Charts, War Thunder had just under 60,000 concurrent players on Steam alone, placing it in the platform's top fifteen. Steam is one of several storefronts for the game.

Start here: our coverage, and what each piece answers

Deciding whether to start: the editorial review weighs content depth, the learning curve, the free-to-play economy and the frustrations, and names who should skip it. No score, because we have not reviewed it hands-on.

→ Is War Thunder worth playing in 2026?

First evening: the beginner's guide explains the three modes, why to start in Arcade, how research, Silver Lions and Golden Eagles fit together, and a first-session plan.

→ War Thunder beginner's guide 2026: how to start without wasting time

Settings: the settings guide separates options that cost frames from options that change what you can see, and explains the 2021 change that made most older advice wrong.

→ Best War Thunder PC settings for FPS and visibility

Patches: we summarise Gaijin's changelogs in plain English, starting with the 2 September 2026 update.

→ War Thunder update 2.57.1.126: what changed

Alternatives: our free-games round-up places War Thunder alongside fourteen other verified-free PC games.

→ 15 best free PC games to play in September 2026

What we have not verified, and will not assert

• Which nation is 'best' for beginners. Balance shifts with patches and any confident answer is stale within months.
• Frame-rate gains from individual settings. We have not benchmarked the game.
• Exact repair costs, research point values or Battle Ratings for specific vehicles. Gaijin's official wiki has per-vehicle pages.
• The correct storage figure. Gaijin's notice and the Steam page disagree (23.1/75.9 GB versus 70/95 GB); we report both.

How we cover War Thunder

Facts on this page come from Gaijin's changelog, requirements notice, development blog and official wiki, the Steam listing, Wikipedia's cited release history and one specialist settings guide, all read on the dates shown. Currency and crew names come from the community wiki and are labelled as such. Update summaries are written from the official changelog and link to it.