Epic Games is rebuilding its launcher to make it "feel good to use"

The Epic Games Store has been live for seven years now. Originally landing as a PC-exclusive platform as a rival to Steam, the store grew to arrive on mobile platforms iOS and Android. Today, Epic Games shared its latest 'Year in Review' deep dive, taking a look at what it accomplished in 2025 and, more importantly, what is incoming in 2026.

The behemoth behind Fortnite said today that it is focused on "delivering long-requested features and deeper platform improvements" this year for the launcher.

This involves an architecture upgrade for the Epic Games Store that's slated to land sometime this summer, giving PC gamers something that's much smoother to use.

"These changes will make the storefront on the launcher responsive and feel good to use, with fast load times and greater stability," explained the company.

Community spaces were also mentioned as a new feature in development. Outside of personalization like having avatars and profiles, it will be designed to let players communicate with each other across platforms. While only text chat will be available at first, Epic is planning to roll out voice chat and party systems to the social system later.

In another surprise move, in fall 2026, Epic will introduce a cross-platform library for PC and mobile users of the Epic Games Store alongside regional storefronts. While details are scarce, this could mean that another system like Xbox Play Anywhere will soon be available, but this time across PC and mobile.

Other upcoming features include a cross-promotion system to offer themed Fortnite cosmetic items when purchasing games from the store, which Steam users may remember as a classic tactic used for promotions in Team Fortress 2, as well as a library management system for the mobile app.

"In short: we’re building a fairer, more open marketplace for players and developers. As we move into 2026, we remain committed to empowering developers and delivering the best possible experience for players, wherever they play," added the company.

Epic Games also detailed today some statistics about its store in 2025. This included $400 million being spent by users on third-party games (a 57% year-over-year increase), 2.78 billion third-party gameplay hours (a 4% year-over-year increase), and $1.16 billion being spent on the Epic Games Store by PC players (a 6% bump).

While total gameplay hours across the store had fallen by 14% compared to last year, Epic says that third-party games had pulled in 4% more hours this year.