Hearthstone has added exactly one class since it launched in 2014. That was Demon Hunter, back in 2020. At BlizzCon 2026, Blizzard announced the second: Monk, arriving in March 2027 with Chen Stormstout as its hero.
That is the headline, but it is the far end of a roadmap that starts much sooner. The next expansion, Reign of the Black Empire, lands on 20 October, and a new Battlegrounds minion type arrives before that on 22 September.
Monk, and why it took seven years
Blizzard's description of the class is short: agile and adaptable, bringing a whole new way to play. Chen Stormstout - the pandaren brewmaster who has been kicking around Warcraft lore since a Warcraft III easter egg - is the face of it. Specific mechanics and the hero power have not been shown.
Adding a class to a card game this mature is a much larger job than adding an expansion. Every existing set has to be considered for Monk-legal cards, the core set has to make room, and the Arena and Standard metagames both absorb an entirely new colour of deck. Demon Hunter's 2020 launch is the cautionary example - it arrived so far above the power curve that Blizzard nerfed it within days.
The roadmap suggests Blizzard has learned from that: Monk lands in patch 38.2, alongside a core set refresh and a set rotation, which means it enters a deliberately reset format rather than an established one.
Reign of the Black Empire, 20 October
The expansion takes Hearthstone tens of thousands of years back, to an ancient Azeroth where the Old Gods were at the peak of their power and at war with the Titans.
Two mechanics come with it. There is a dedicated Old God mechanic, and there is Assemble, a keyword that fuses two minions together into something considerably worse for whoever is sitting opposite you. Blizzard says Assemble touches around 250 cards, which puts it well beyond a single-archetype gimmick.
Pre-purchase bundles are already on the Battle.net Shop, with in-game pre-purchase opening 15 September at 10:00 a.m. PDT. A free M.O.T.H.E.R. Legendary is claimable when patch 36.6 goes live.
Battlegrounds gets Aberrations on 22 September
Aberrations are a new minion type debuting in patch 36.6.1, and they are built on a payoff loop rather than a stat curve. Every time an Aberration minion dies, it stirs a sleeping Old God - and once that Old God wakes up, it starts affecting the board directly.
The design reads as a deliberate counterweight to Battlegrounds lobbies that resolve into slow scaling races. A tribe that wants its own minions to die gives the mode a reason to trade aggressively in the mid-game, which is not something most existing tribes reward.
The full roadmap through April 2027
Blizzard published an unusually detailed schedule covering September 2026 through April 2027, and it contains most of the year's surprises.
The notable entries:
- 36.6 - expansion reveal, the Aberration minion type, and a new event type called Black Market.
- 36.8 - Reign of the Black Empire launches, with Old Gods cosmetics, a new Arena season and the debut of the new Hearthstone Journey.
- 37.2 - Battlegrounds Season 14, the Winter Veil holiday Tavern Brawl, and a 2v2 Tavern Brawl.
- 37.4 - a class set, the Face the Betrayer Illidan Tavern Brawl with Illidan cosmetics, and the Black Market's return.
- 37.6 - the next expansion reveal, plus a Hearthstone Warchief Tavern Brawl.
- 38.2 - the Monk class arrives with a full expansion, core set refresh and rotation, and Battlegrounds Season 15 introduces a Pandaren minion type and a new Boss Fight event.
The Journal is being rebuilt
The Journal system is getting an overhaul into a weekly, evolving progression track carrying quests, boss battles and limited-time events, with expansions organised narratively rather than as a flat list.
On phones this is the change most likely to be felt daily. Hearthstone's mobile audience largely plays in short sessions, and progression systems that require checking three separate screens to work out what is worth doing have been a persistent friction point. A single weekly track that tells you what is live is a meaningful quality-of-life shift regardless of what is in the card packs.
Blizzard has also lined up the Pandaren theming with intent - a Pandaren minion type in Battlegrounds landing in the same patch as a pandaren-led class is not a coincidence. It is the first time in years the card game's two halves have been pointed at the same thing at the same time.
