WoW Forever Level 1 to 20 Takes 20.5 Hours, Almost Identical to Classic

By Indie Kings | September 26, 2026

Updated September 26, 2026: Blizzard design leads have confirmed that reaching level 20 in World of Warcraft: Forever takes almost exactly as long as it did in Classic WoW, averaging 20.5 hours against 20.4 hours. Senior Game Designer Josh "Aggrend" Greenfield and Lead Classic Designer Tim Jones gave the figures on the World of Warcraft: Forever podcast.

Source note: The hours figure comes from Blizzard's own WoW Forever podcast via Icy Veins. A separate quote from Principal Designer Kris Zierhut was given to The Sun at a post-BlizzardCon interview and is relayed by Icy Veins, so treat it as a second-hand quote rather than a primary transcript.

Image: World of Warcraft: Forever. Credit: Icy Veins.

The two numbers

Per the World of Warcraft: Forever podcast, Senior Game Designer Josh "Aggrend" Greenfield and Lead Classic Designer Tim Jones confirmed that the journey from level 1 to level 20 takes almost exactly the same amount of time in Forever as it does in Classic.

A six-minute difference across an average of twenty hours is inside the noise. This is not a game that has quietly accelerated or slowed early progression, and that is the point worth taking from the disclosure.

Why dungeons feel different even though the clock does not

The route you take changed even though the total did not. The Forever team made deliberate adjustments to where experience comes from, concentrated on instanced content.

Two changes pull in opposite directions. Dungeon mobs now award considerably less experience than they used to. Dungeon quests give substantially more, which makes a first clear of an instance highly rewarding. The net effect is the same total, redistributed.

There is a design intent behind it, and it is explicit: the change discourages players from spamming dungeon runs to level and pushes them toward the open world instead. That matters for Forever specifically, because the game adds over 1,000 new quests and new dungeons. If instanced experience were unchanged, the optimal route would be to ignore the bulk of that new content.

The experience curve did not change

There is a second, stronger statement behind the hours figure, and it comes from a different source. At a post-BlizzardCon interview with The Sun, Principal Designer Kris Zierhut said the experience curve remains the same and that Blizzard did not change it. Icy Veins relays that quote.

Taken with the podcast figures, the two statements are consistent. If the curve is unchanged and the total time to 20 is unchanged, then the redistribution of experience between dungeon mobs and dungeon quests is a routing change rather than a balance change to progression.

That also explains why the new content does not inflate the time budget. New quests added to the open world do not make the journey longer if the curve is the same, they change what you do during it.

What the figures do not cover yet

Two limits are worth stating clearly, because this is beta data and the cap is not the cap the game will ship with.

The first is the level cap. The beta caps at 20, and Icy Veins notes the cap is set to increase beyond 20 during testing. These figures describe the first 20 levels only. A game can match Classic perfectly to level 20 and diverge sharply afterwards, and Forever also changes classes, so the mid and late game is where any divergence would most likely appear.

The second is the population the average describes. An average of 20.5 hours is a mean across beta testers, not a target for an individual. Routes, group availability, and dungeon experience vary more between players than the mean suggests.

Nobody should read this as a guarantee that the full 1 to 60 journey will feel like Classic. It is a data point from the first fifth of the game, and it is a reassuring one.

FAQ

How long does it take to reach level 20 in WoW Forever?
An average of 20.5 hours, according to Senior Game Designer Josh "Aggrend" Greenfield and Lead Classic Designer Tim Jones on the World of Warcraft: Forever podcast, via Icy Veins.

How does that compare to Classic WoW?
Classic averages 20.4 hours to level 20, so the two are within roughly six minutes of each other. The difference is inside the noise.

Did Blizzard change the experience curve for Forever?
Principal Designer Kris Zierhut told The Sun that the experience curve remains the same and was not changed. Icy Veins relays that quote from a post-BlizzardCon interview.

Do dungeons give more or less experience in Forever?
Dungeon mobs give considerably less experience than in Classic, while dungeon quests give substantially more. The first clear of an instance is therefore highly rewarding, which discourages repeatedly running dungeons to level.

Does this mean the whole 1 to 60 journey will match Classic?
No. These figures cover the first 20 levels only, and the beta cap of 20 is set to rise during testing. Forever also changes classes, so later progression is not covered by this data.

How many new quests does Forever add?
Over 1,000 new quests, alongside new dungeons, according to Icy Veins. This is why the dungeon experience change matters, since instanced experience was otherwise the fastest route and would bypass most of that content.

Bottom Line

Blizzard has confirmed with numbers that World of Warcraft: Forever does not accelerate early progression, with 20.5 hours to level 20 against Classic's 20.4. The more interesting detail is that the same total is reached by a different route, because dungeon mob experience was cut while dungeon quest experience was raised, which is a deliberate push away from instanced grinding and toward the over 1,000 new open world quests. The caveat is scope. This covers 20 levels in a game that caps at 60, with a beta cap that is about to rise and a class revamp that could change later pacing. It is a strong signal about the first fifth of the journey and no evidence at all about the rest.

Source: Icy Veins, Blizzard reveals an interesting stat about WoW Forever's average leveling speed, reporting the World of Warcraft: Forever podcast and a Kris Zierhut interview with The Sun

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