World of Warcraft’s transmogrification system is finally getting a major facelift with its 2026 Midnight expansion, with one-time gold costs for outfits and the ability to automatically swap between looks based on certain situations.
As it is now, players in Blizzard’s MMORPG use transmog to transform the appearance of individual items into different ones, allowing them to create and save different outfits. It costs varying amounts of gold each time an appearance is changed.
However, because the transmog is tied to the items themselves and not the item slot it goes in, getting a new piece of gear means having to frequently re-transmog gear. It’s particularly noticeable at the beginning of an expansion or the start of a new season, when players are constantly getting new gear upgrades. Rather than spending the gold to transmog each item immediately, many players just wait, knowing they’ll receive yet another item upgrade in a few hours or days that will require more gold to transmog. In the meantime, they are wearing an eclectic combination of different visual styles that do not go together at all, instead of the finely customized outfits whose appearances required spending hours grinding old raids and dungeons.
The system has been largely unchanged since it was first introduced in 2011 as part of the game’s Cataclysm expansion, but that will all finally change in Midnight, with Blizzard shifting transmog so it’s based on item slots. That means players will only need to transmog a slot one time to keep that appearance for as long as they’d like. Even better, saving individual outfits will only have a one-time gold cost. After that, they can be swapped for free, a boon for players who constantly find themselves swapping between looks.
“For someone who transmogs frequently, this is going to be much, much, much, much cheaper, gold-wise,” WoW senior game director Ion Hazzikostas told GameSpot in an interview prior to the expansion’s full reveal at Gamescom.
Outfits are a big part of the other key addition to the transmog system coming as part of Midnight, which Blizzard is calling Situations. The system will make it so players can have their characters automatically equip different outfits based on the situation. Blizzard gave examples of players using Situations to automatically swap into a more casual, civilian outfit upon entering their house, or using it to adopt a different look for their gear when changing specializations.
Whether players want to keep a persistent look, show off their miss-matched gear, or swap between a different outfit for every occasion, WoW’s revamped transmog system will allow for that flexibility, associate game director Paul Kubit said.
“It gives players a lot of cool ways to express themselves, it should be a lot more ergonomic to work with, and arguably more fun too,” Kubit said.
An overhauled transmog system is just one of the new additions coming as part of Midnight, which doesn’t have an exact release date but is slated to arrive early next year, according to Hazzikostas. Blizzard revealed that player housing, one of Midnight’s biggest features, will actually be playable as part of the game’s 11.2.7 patch for those who preorder the new expansion. Players will be able to acquire their home and start decorating with The War Within’s final patch, with the full housing feature, including its neighborhood system, coming as part of Midnight.
Midnight will additionally revamp the Blood Elf lands of Quel’thalas, add a new Allied Race, introduce a third, Void-themed Demon Hunter specialization, and more. Midnight’s opening cinematic, depicting a battle between the Blood Elves and the Void forces of Xal’atath, debuted as part of Gamescom Opening Night Live.