Fortnite battle royale is one of the biggest games on the planet currently and has been since its initial launch into beta in 2017. Epic Games crafted not just a great game but one that continues to excel based on its exceptional quality of life changes, live experiences, and innovations.

The Fortnite Map Intense Changes Over the Years

Part of the innovation in Fortnite has been due to its battle royale map. The Fortnite map has gone through so many changes in its lifetime that we wouldn’t even know where to begin if we directly put the original map and the current one next to one another.

The map is almost nothing like what it was at the start of the game. Likely, 10 seasons from now that will be more true than ever before. The map is the most core feature that makes the battle royale experience what it is for players in the game.

After all, every single match that a player does in Fortnite is on the map that is available at that time. It affects everything that a player does and chooses in the match from where to land and explore for loot, where to head after that, and what places to avoid.

The map is an integral part of the experience that is one of, if not, the most important parts of the entire game. The Fortnite map’s history gives a glimpse of the past and the future at the same time. That is why we are giving you a full history of where it has been up to this point.

We are going over every single major change and addition throughout all 12 total seasons, including the turn after Season X when the game had a restart. Also, we aren’t going just to leave you with the past either.

We are going to use what we know about the game thus far to shape and figure out where we think the massive battle royale title will be going after the current season and beyond. Without further ado, let’s dive right in and look at everything that has happened to the Fortnite map.

Where It All Started: Season 1 Fortnite Map

The beginning of the Fortnite battle royale map was an extraordinary place. The genre was just becoming popular due to PUBG and other games, and Fortnite arrived on the scene just in time to sweep up all the fame and recognition for what it was doing for the genre.

The Season 1 map of Fortnite was classic and something many players today are still nostalgic about, hopefully, returning to at some point. At the start, there were only 13 named locations on a map that was seemingly only one terrain in total.

If you look at the map from afar, everything just looks so green and uniform compared to now. That was because the environments didn’t have much variation at the time when the game first came out. There were a few exceptions to this, but it was mostly a standardized island.

Here are the 13 named locations in the very first season of Fortnite:

• Pleasant Park
• Anarchy Acres
• Loot Lake
• Greasy Grove
• Dusty Depot
• Salty Springs
• Flush Factory
• Fatal Fields
• Moisty Mire
• Retail Row
• Tomato Town
• Lonely Lodge
• Wailing Woods

These locations right here are the classics, many of which still have a lasting impression on the game even now in its 12th total season. While most of the areas were small towns or rural locations, there were some notable exceptions.

Moisty Mire, Wailing Woods, and Loot Lake. Moisty Mire offered a different change from the typical greenery by offering a nasty-looking murky swamp. Though it was unique at the time, it wasn’t that well-received as a location and mostly avoided by players.

On the other hand, Loot Lake was one of the most popular destinations on the original battle royale map. A massive lake near the middle of the map, it offered a water location on an otherwise dry island. In the middle of the lake, though, was a massive house.

That house was home to lots of loot to pick up and became the site of many final circle fights. And then there was Wailing Woods, a forest location that offered a darker and different atmosphere than anywhere else in the map. The northern side of the island, in particular, was more open than the rest and was a popular spot for me.

Season 2 Fortnite Map

The original Fortnite map was a classic place but it had to change and grow as time went on, which is what happened in Season 2. Here, the map got fleshed out and became something more interesting than just the same old, same old that it was before.

At the launch of the second season, five new named locations added to the game:

• Junk Junction
• Haunted Hills
• Snobby Shores
• Tilted Towers
• Shifty Shafts

These locations changed the metagame considerably and made it closer to what it would be for a very long time. As you can see, the five new locations mostly filled out the western half of the battle royale map with several new areas to explore.

Tilted Towers was the first major city to ever be in the game, instead of just a small town, with skyscrapers and large buildings that loomed over the tiny stores and houses found elsewhere. It quickly became the most popular named area in the entire game and a dangerous place to visit.

Players had to be careful as heading here would likely result in the death of you at the start of a match if you weren’t quick and efficient. Snobby Shores was a particular favorite for this author because it wasn’t that popular and it had some solid loot.

Also, the greenery of everything gave way for more detailed and varied terrain around the map like the northern side becoming more rolling yellow hills, especially around Anarchy Acres. Beyond that, a few new unnamed locations added like the famous Motel.

Season 3 Map

Season 3 was a strange time for the battle royale game as it experienced the least amount of changes ever in the history of the game. Never since then has there been such a lull in the changes for the battle royale map. There was a single named location added to the map.

That location was none other than Lucky Landing. This location came to the bottom of the map and was the southernmost point there, beating out the former winner of Flush Factory. It was just on the edge of the island and had a more Asian vibe to it.

Though Lucky Landing was a very nice place to look at as probably the most attractive destination, its popularity didn’t last. It didn’t take long for the metagame to just remain as it was in Season 2 with Lucky Landing not being visited as much as others like Loot Lake and Tilted Towers.

Season 4 Map

Though Season 3 was mostly an understandable disappointment as Epic Games took time to figure out what to do with the island, Season 4 was a step in the right direction and more towards how things would be for most seasons moving forward.

Instead of adding a ton of new locations, Season 4 was about adding few new locations but mostly changing up the existing ones to give players something new to look forward to, even at their favorite spots. In a sorely empty spot near Wailing Woods was a new location.

That location is Risky Reels, a drive-in movie theater that was unique at the time and welcomed by players. At the same time, Dusty Depot had a departure in that it was partially destroyed to make way for Dusty Divot.

Dusty Divot would not only change up what we knew about Dusty Depot thus far, but what could happen to a named location on the map. Also, it took over the unnamed warehouse location that was near the depot previously.

Other unnamed places came to the map like the hero’s mansion and the villain’s lair.

Season 5 Map

This author and others regard Season 5 as one of the best battle royale seasons of all-time. It shifted the metagame significantly on the Fortnite map by changing up what we thought it could be. Before this, some biomes had been on the island.

But with the launch of Season 5, Epic Games made the smart decision to rid the island of the disliked Moisty Mire with a desert region in the southeastern section of the map. Paradise Palms took over as the main city in that area and players along with its nearby racetrack quickly welcomed it.

Also, Anarchy Acres moved out of the way for the more popular and appreciated Lazy Links golf course. Beyond that, there were other minor areas added, like the unnamed Vikings area. Also, the soccer stadium removed from the island.

Overall, the metagame of Season 5 was near the peak of what Fortnite would be to that point. It importantly shook the island, making way for new terrain that we hadn’t experienced before. It also helped to split the population of matches away from everyone just congregating in the same couple of areas.

Though all of that happened early in the season, another change occurred a little later on in Season 5. Tomato Temple, another not very popular area, changed into the famous Tomato Town where it would become a more valuable section of the battle royale map.

Season 6 Map

Season 6 of battle royale is where Epic Games started to go full-on into the live experience format by having the seasonal changes a gradual tease until a massive event happens. It all started with the cube creating the floating island that was initially floating above Loot Lake.

The floating island suddenly became an interesting part of the metagame as it would float around to the seven different corrupted areas around the map. These areas were, for the most part, in between named locations and supplemented the already dense battle royale island.

Players could land on this unique floating island and find a ton of loot there. Where it would spawn varied depending on which corrupted areas it would be over. At the bottom of it was a vent that would allow players to float up to it or glide away somewhere else.

This, however, was only the beginning of what would happen during Season 6 to the floating island. From there, it broke apart into three parts with the cube at the center of it all. This led to Loot Lake changing up significantly and becoming Leaky Lake.

From there, the floating island was eventually destroyed. Much of the remains of it landed in Leaky Lake with the cube pieces in the whirlpool in the middle. This created a more diverse Leaky Lake area that would stick around as the game moved into the amazing Season 7.

Season 7 Map

In a lot of ways, Season 7 was one of the top tier seasons that happened most recently in the game. While some of the other ones would lack innovation or general uniqueness, there is no denying that Season 7 expanded the game even further, much like Season 5 before it.

Season 7 is also one of my favorite seasons ever in the game, and easily one of the best that has ever happened in the history of Fortnite. It came right around the winter season in the real world (at least in the northern hemisphere) and, therefore, came with some new snowy locations.

Three new points of interest joined the game in Season 7:

• Frosty Flights
• Happy Hamlet
• Polar Peak

Those three new locations are in the southwestern quadrant of the island where the new snowy biome was introduced. They are different and offer something unique that we hadn’t seen in the game. Much like with what Paradise Palms and the desert region did in Season 5.

Frosty Flights was an airport-focused place that took advantage of the first aerial vehicle released in the game. Airplanes were a new feature in Season 7 that changed the game forever. Frosty Flights was a great place for finding those planes and flying them around the map.

Meanwhile, Happy Hamlet was a cute location unlike anything else seen before in the game. This picturesque location was a quaint little town. It had a nice appeal to it and a clock tower that loomed over the snowy winter town.

Lastly, Polar Peak was simply a frozen mountain of sorts where a mysterious castle was submerged. Meanwhile, this massive change to a snowy area resulted in the loss of Flush Factory and Greasy Grove. That was unfortunate but the new locations were welcome, nonetheless.

Expedition outposts also appeared around the map as unnamed locations where players could find lots of loot and complete various challenges. Lastly, The Block replaced Risky Reels. This new location allowed Epic Games to show off fan creations to the world.

Season 8 Map

Season 8 of Fortnite was an interesting departure from the snowy theme of the previous one as the world began to warm up. Two new named locations added to the game in the form of Sunny Steps and Lazy Lagoon. The former had interesting Mayan-like architecture.

At the same time, Lazy Lagoon was a massive lake area that replaced Lazy Links, being pirate-themed and showcased a pirate town with a huge ship docked. The Block moved in the process to the western side of the island.

The pirate theme of Season 8 led to new camps that appeared around the battle royale map. At the same time, a volcano emerged from the ground and destroyed Wailing Woods at the launch of the new season. It was an unnamed location at first but interesting addition.

Later in the season, the volcano exploded in an event and destroyed Tilted Towers and most of Retail Row.

Season 9 Map

With so many changes because of the volcano, the ninth season led to major changes no one expected. Tilted Towers, a place that had been previously untouched, became Neo Tilted in this fancy cyberpunk-like season.

Retail Row turned into its own cyberpunk Mega Mall named location. The volcano, in turn, became the point of interest known as Pressure Plant. As a minor addition, several sky platforms were added. Like the floating island before, these were floating locations with loot.

Eventually, as Season 9 went on, a giant monster emerged from the remains of Polar Peak while a huge mech was created. A massive fight between the two followed where the mech came out on top. The monster’s remains became a new point of interest called Skeletal Remains.

Season X Map

Season 10, or season X, saw the nostalgic return of some fan-favorite points of interest. The Dusty Divot location became Dusty Depot once again, along with the return of the unnamed factory that left with it.

Oddly enough, meteor froze in place above the map that suspended on the island for the duration of the season. The orb at Loot Lake exploded in the season, creating an anti-gravity area around the lake location.

Meanwhile, the Skeletal Remains became covered in purple grass and trees. Lastly, Neo Tilted didn’t stick around for very long as it became Tilted Town. Throughout the season, more changes started to happen. One was the return of Retail Row from being Mega Mall in Season 9.

A Pandora island appeared in the southeastern corner of the map in the desert region. It was part of the temporary crossover event between Fortnite and the newly released Borderlands 3. The floating island from Season 6 came back, too, and began roaming around the whole map.

Eventually, the Pandora location removed during the season and Paradise Palms became Moisty Palms, a hybrid between the former and Moisty Mire from previous seasons. Greasy Grove also made its triumphant return and Gotham City arrived as a replacement for Tilted Town during a Batman crossover.

Eventually, a live event happened where the meteor and rockets created a black hole. It consumed the entire island and all the players there. Thus, ended Chapter 1 and began the start of the second chapter of battle royale that we are currently in.

Chapter 2 Begins: Season 1

Chapter 2 began with the black hole ending and sending players to a brand-new island, but with a few familiar faces. Chapter 2 was set on an entirely new battle royale island with a ton of named locations. You can find the full list at the start of Season 1 below:

• Sweaty Sands
• Holly Hedges
• Weeping Woods
• Slurpy Swamp
• Misty Meadows
• Lazy Lake
• Dirty Docks
• Steamy Stacks
• Frenzy Farm
• Salty Springs
• Craggy Cliffs
• Pleasant Park
• Retail Row

Retail Row, Pleasant Park, and Salty Springs were completely familiar locations that players would remember from Chapter 1. Meanwhile, Weeping Woods and Lazy Lake were remixes of old locations from Chapter 1 along with all the new areas like Sweaty Sands and Holly Hedges.

While those were the new locations on the new island, there were dozens of new landmark locations that were unnamed areas like Risky Reels and more.

Season 2

After the longest season in battle royale history, Season 1 finally ended and Season 2 began. Here, five new named locations added to an otherwise unchanged map. Each themed around the spy and secret agent theme of the season with minibosses and vaults.

Here are the five new locations in this current season:

• The Shark
• The Agency
• The Grotto
• The Rig
• The Yacht

Predictions: Season 3 and Beyond

As we are in the middle of Season 2, we begin to look towards the third season and beyond that. The current battle royale map only has a little bit of room left for new locations. We don’t expect the third season to get more than one or two new named areas.

However, we wouldn’t be surprised to see some of these locations to get major changes and become something else. We expect the first ones to have this happen are returning named locations from Chapter 1. We could see Salty Springs or Pleasant Park change into something somewhat new like with Weeping Woods and Lazy Lake.

What we would like to see is a second battle royale map release for the game that you can pick between. It would be great for that other map not to be a brand new one, but the Chapter 1 map for those players who miss it.

We do expect after the 20th season for the third chapter to begin with a third battle royale map blending some of the new and old. Much like the case with the current Chapter 2 battle royale island.