Hello world!
As I mentioned in my 2025 Wrap-Up, the D&D Beyond team is committed to being more transparent about our development process and to keeping communication with you—our community—flowing.
Today, I’m happy to share D&D Beyond’s public development Roadmap hub! This is something we plan to keep updated for years to come, all from one central place.
D&D Beyond’s 2026 Development Roadmap
The new Roadmap hub lives on a static landing page. Check it out here:
Be sure to check back regularly for updates!
A few important caveats about the information included on the Roadmap hub:
- Quality-of-life improvements and bug fixes are not included. The roadmap will focus on larger features and projects.
- Priorities and scope can change, and sometimes a planned feature may never launch at all. Software development is a winding road, not often a linear path.
- We reserve the right to surprise and delight you sometimes.
Roadmap items are split into 3 categories:
- Now: Roll for Initiative! We’re actively working on this right now.
- Next: Make an Investigation check. We’re designing, scoping, researching. Active development has not yet begun.
- Complete: It’s live on D&D Beyond, ICYMI!
The team and I look forward to hearing what you think of the roadmap and the features we are working on. With that in mind, join Zac Cohn and me for a Reddit AMA on Feb 24 at 10 AM PT at r/dndbeyond. We look forward to answering your questions about D&D Beyond there.
Roadmap Priorities
Over the past few months, we’ve launched a new homepage, a revamped and more sortable content library, image reveals in the Maps VTT to help DMs immerse their players more easily, and several other quality-of-life improvements.
2026 is a year of refocusing and rebuilding D&D Beyond to make it easier to play D&D your way. Three major initiatives will drive most of our work:
- Rebuilding D&D Beyond’s Game Platform
- Improving Player Onboarding and Revamping the Character Builder Experience
- Launching a Suite of Dungeon Master Tools
I’d like to introduce you to a few members of the team to discuss these three major initiatives in detail.
Rebuilding D&D Beyond’s Game Platform

Laura Thompson (Software Engineering Manager, D&D Beyond Game Platform)
To power everything we have planned for D&D Beyond, we’re rebuilding our Game Platform from the ground up. D&D has grown to be more dynamic and interconnected, and our systems need to scale with this evolution.
The new platform is an opinionated set of modular, scalable services designed to work together seamlessly. It is fundamentally data-driven, so rules, content, access, search, and messaging can be defined and updated as data rather than hard-coded logic. In short: we’re building a true game engine for D&D Beyond.
For players and Dungeon Masters, that will mean faster load times, more responsive character updates, smarter search, and smoother rules validation. This multi-phase project will take time to complete, but you’ll begin to see benefits with releases this year.
Because rules will be defined as data instead of hard-coded logic, we can deliver updates and new options more quickly and reliably. And later this year, when the new Character Builder fully launches on this platform, you’ll experience expanded build flexibility, stronger compatibility with the rules, and a foundation ready for deeper play.
Improving Player Onboarding and Revamping the Character Builder Experience
Jeff Turriff (Director of Product Management, D&D Beyond)
Character creation is the front door to D&D, and we want to make that first experience more inspiring and more intuitive without sacrificing depth. That’s why in March, we’re launching Quickbuilder, the first public milestone in our Character Builder modernization project.
It’s a streamlined, art-forward way to build a level 1 character in just a few guided steps, letting you make the most impactful character decisions while using thoughtful, optimized defaults for the details so you can go from idea to playable hero in minutes. It’s designed to spark creativity and reduce cognitive load, whether you’re brand new to D&D or a veteran spinning up your next concept.
And importantly, it’s built on our new game platform foundation, so it’s fast, flexible, and ready to evolve.
Quickbuilder is just the beginning. Throughout the year, we’ll expand it into a fully modernized Character Builder that supports deeper customization, advanced options, and multiple creation paths, all powered by our new data-defined rules engine.
We’re taking a phased approach so players can jump in at the beginning, give feedback, and help shape what comes next.
The goal is simple: Build Your Character Your Way.
Launching a Suite of Dungeon Master Tools

Zac Cohn (Principal Technical Product Manager, D&D Beyond DM Tools)
We have two big focuses for our Maps VTT this year: Quality-of-life improvements and DM prep.
Our product development philosophy for Maps is “Honda Accord, not F-16." Anyone should be able to sit down and immediately know how to drive it. We’re continually looking for ways to make D&D easier to play and to introduce new features that improve the Maps experience. We’ve already released three quality-of-life updates this year, with features ranging from Copy and Paste, Polygonal Fog of War, and Monster Reveals, to 90 new stickers. Expect plenty more progress here, both big and small.
Speaking of making D&D easier to play, we know one of the biggest barriers for new and experienced DMs alike is the amount of prep work required to run a game.
That’s why, throughout the year, we’re rolling out a number of DM Prep features, including new ways to document what happened during a session, easier ways to embed rules, lore, and rollable tables, and embedding your prep directly into the tools you use to run the game.
These tools will reduce the cognitive overhead of DMing, reduce tab switching or the need to hunt for information in the middle of a game, and, most of all, help new and potential DMs build confidence running their first campaigns.
Let's Keep Talking
Brian touching base back at the end to close us out.
I truly believe D&D is the best way to spend time with your friends. Our job on D&D Beyond is to make it easier for everyone to experience that joy of playing—however they want to play. We love all the questions you keep asking and ideas you keep sharing to help us continue to make things easier. So, thank you so much for continuing to spend your time with us and for sharing your feedback. It really does help shape what we build next.
Speaking of feedback, don’t forget to join us for our next D&D Beyond Reddit AMA on Feb 24 at 10 AM PT over at r/dndnext. See you there!







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Posted Feb 19, 2026The only thing missing was a translation into Brazilian Portuguese.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026So far, this looks amazing. I use the suite to DM 2 groups, and make a lot of characters. I have suggestions if you are daring. Question, do you need a journal keeper before you add the ability to simply type letters on the map?
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Posted Feb 19, 2026Thanks for all your work here. Can I ask that you consider giving a little attention to the Encounters toolset? I run an in-person game, typically with tabeletop minis but I find the initiative tracker and encounter builder handy, especially for players who are using Beyond for their character sheets. For now it's limited to 2014 scaling rules which I imagine will be a problem eventually.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026I would be curious if the changes being made with to the Character Creator 2.0 might make it possible to integrate Drakkenheim's Apothecary Class as well as Loot Tavern's Tamer Class.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026I also think it would be nice to have the DM tools available outside VTT as well. We play both VTT and physical TT with Miniatures and it would be very useful to have lists, random encounter tables, etc. so I can use them without having to load VTT. There are a lot of tools out there, but it would be nice to have it integrated with the purchased books I have.
Also, building things on the fly can be very annoying when I just want to use the stuff I have purchased and not keep clicking to find out I need to purchase a book to use it. At least if the filter was easier to use to turn this on that would be helpful, since sometimes when planning, I want to see what else is out there.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026Colour me jaded I don't mind the QL updates but this needs to be compatible with all types of devices I have a player that uses a tablet to see the maps when playing i use a 5 year old chrome book (she's old but she works).
While working on the character build add the mutations for drakkenheim and the transformations for grim hollow and the tamer class from helina also folks
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Posted Feb 19, 2026Please make an AI dungeon master inside Beyond, so for solo player we can buy book, and play our character directly on beyond
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Posted Feb 19, 2026This sounds great. I'm really looking forward to some of these features. One thing I'd like to suggest is API access, both to create and extract homebrew content as well as access to create or extract character data. This would really help those of us who like to homebrew stuff.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026I would like to be able to run a PbP game from within the campaign itself rather than over Discord or using the forums.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026no AI please
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Posted Feb 19, 2026Regarding the homebrew question - a lot of the issues our current homebrew has is due to the current system being old and inflexible. The section that Laura spoke to would enable us to provide a better homebrew experience (as well as more functional tools) down the line.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026I think DM prep is a bad idea as a focus when a lot of the simple mechanics of the map part is still a tangled mess.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026I too am interested to read what the plans are to maintain functionality for both 2014 and 2024 editions. For those of us who invested hundreds of dollars into the 2014 books, we should have the ability to use them as written entirely not superseded by the 2024 rules in places as is currently happening in places or attached to character sheet descriptions like weapon mastery qualities.
Many of us prefer 2014 and are still finishing campaigns using those rules and have no desire to switch to 2024 as yet, not to mention that it has caused many problems for navigation trying to force the material on us as seen in streams and local games. Since you're building from the ground up give users the option to play and use the material the way we want to. It will be good PR and that never hurts to help build back loyalty and trust which for some have been an issue.
There are many great things that have been done with 2024 but there are several things that were not and that all depends on your own personal experiences, perceptions, and desires for one's own individual game. Some have bought in entirely with 2024 and that is their right to do so, some have not. It would be nice to have the option as users paying for this service to be able to decide in what manner we want to use it be it 2014, 2024, or some hybrid therein.
It would also be nice to be able to fully use the third-party materials to build out characters properly with their options like LotR or Grim Hollow without having to home brew it but I realize that at best will be far down the road.
Lastly, please improve the app as I have players who cannot use a campaign link to join the campaign they are invited to which is frustrating enough but the functionality, intuitiveness of use, and just general friendliness of it is not easily ascertained and when you are trying not to delay a game has lead to their frustration.
I do appreciate your updates and efforts as a former programmer I have some idea of the task before you.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026I will admit the focus on DM tools being tied to VTT is a problem. TTRPGs are an in person social experience whenever possible, so having to run things through a VTT either makes the tools unused or worthless for a large number of players that try to actually play face to face. If the tools are presented in a usable, low bandwidth format and you don't have to build them in Maps, that would be far superior for a lot of DMs.
I'm really hoping that the ball isn't dropped 4E style by attempting to force a video game style experience on people that want to play TTRPGs. You would think that people would learn from the mistakes of the past.
That being said, cleaning up the interface and making homebrew easier are both solid goals, and a good encounter tracker that works well with physical games would be amazing. Tracking debuffs and buffs is especially nice when you sometimes have encounters split over multiple sessions.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026I hope the DM upgrades include being able to link/assign encounters to maps and campaigns. Makes no sense for me to make an encounter that I then have to recreate in the map, as well as being able to access said things from the campaign page. It feels really disconnected from one another.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026Can we please get a co-DM setup implemented?
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Posted Feb 19, 2026Thanks for the update. So glad to hear that you're working on a full rebuild of thrbplatform! It seems like many features have been blocked by old infrastructure. The maps VTT has been delightfully simple and effective for our table to use, reducing the barrier to playing the game. Excited to see what comes next with that philosophy. Great work and really appreciate the transparency.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026I just want to be able to resize tokens in Maps on the fly. Enlarge/Reduce is a thing.
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Posted Feb 19, 2026I mainly use the mobile app and our entire server of 30+ do as well and we havent ever thought it wasn't user friendly. What issues are you having
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Posted Feb 19, 2026hmmmm, I will temper my expectations. I have not forgotten the injustices of WotC and Hasbro