Rare announces major changes to Sea of Thieves, including custom servers, Insiders, and more

Rare just announced what it has planned for its live service experience Sea of Thieves in upcoming seasons. The studio debuted a Community Direct broadcast today, a new showcase platform that will return every six months to keep players in the loop of what's going on behind the scenes.

Today's studio update revealed that seasons will now have separate events for each of the three months. The first month will carry improvements to the adventure gameplay and the sandbox, the second month will bring live events for expanding the lore, while the third month of the season will gather the community together for server-wide events.

Season 17 is when this new three-month seasonal structure will kick off. This season is already confirmed to introduce smugglers to the title, adding shipping routes, smuggler cargo, hideouts, and more features.

Season 18 also received a sneak peek during the livestream. Rare will be putting its focus on improving The Devil's Roar region, ancient shrines, and Smuggler's League gameplay.

Rare is also putting additional resources into game health, making sure that it stays on top of performance issues and cheating as it continues to add more content to the sandbox.

The Sea of Thieves Insider Program was also touched on, with the studio planning to soon remove the NDA that community testers have been under since its launch years ago. This will allow players to capture footage and share it and discuss upcoming features openly without being restricted to the studio's own forums.

Sea of Thieves fans may remember that Rare first revealed custom servers for the game back in 2020, and finally, the feature is almost ready to ship out. Starting in early 2026, players will be able to subscribe to this premium feature and gain access to fully customizable sessions. These will allow custom commands, game rules, weather control, camera tools for cinematic shots, and other customizations.

Pricing for custom servers has not been announced yet, but it is slated to be a subscription service. Watch the complete Community Direct below.

Rare was one of the studios that was hit by Microsoft's latest wave of Xbox layoffs earlier this month. While the Sea of Thieves team seems to be safe, the studio's Everwild project was cancelled entirely.