If you’ve spent hundreds of hours taming dinos, building fortified bases, and fighting off rival tribes in Ark: Survival Evolved, you’ve almost certainly run into the frustrating crossplay barriers that split the original game’s community. Steam players couldn’t join Xbox lobbies, PlayStation users were stuck in their own ecosystem, and even cross-store play on PC was hit or miss for years. It’s no surprise that one of the most common questions fans ask about the upcoming sequel is will Ark 2 be crossplay, and whether it will fix the gaps that kept friends from playing together in the first game. This guide breaks down all confirmed details, expected features, and small limitations you should know before launch.
Will Ark 2 Be Crossplay? Confirmed Official Details So Far
If you’ve been scouring Reddit threads and official Studio Wildcard updates for answers to will Ark 2 be crossplay, you can stop worrying now: full crossplay support has been confirmed for all launch platforms for months. The dev team named cross-platform play as one of their top priorities after seeing consistent feedback from the original Ark community, where 68% of players surveyed said they had missed out on playing with friends because of platform restrictions. Full crossplay support is confirmed for all launch platforms, no exceptions. At launch, Ark 2 will be available on Xbox Series X/S, PC via Steam and Epic Games Store, and Xbox Cloud Gaming, with full crossplay across all of these platforms. PlayStation 5 support will come after the 12-month timed Xbox exclusivity window ends, and crossplay will extend to PS5 players as soon as the game launches on that platform.
What Crossplay Features Will Be Available For Ark 2?
Crossplay for Ark 2 won’t be the limited, bare-bones feature you might have experienced in the original game. Studio Wildcard has built cross-platform compatibility into the game’s core code, so almost every multiplayer feature works across all supported platforms without extra work from players. The confirmed crossplay features announced so far include:
For example, if you play on Steam on PC, you can join a private server hosted by your friend on Xbox Series X, invite another friend who owns the game on Epic Games Store, and all three of you can build bases, tame high-level dinos, and defend your territory from enemy tribes together without any workarounds. You won't be locked out of playing with friends just because they own the game on a different storefront or console. That’s a massive upgrade from the original Ark, where you often had to buy the game twice to play with groups that used mixed platforms.
Cross-Progression And Other Cross-Platform Perks To Expect
Crossplay isn’t the only cross-platform feature coming to Ark 2. The dev team has also confirmed full cross-progression support, tied to your free Studio Wildcard account, so you can carry your progress across any platforms you own the game on. That means if you put 100 hours into the game on Xbox while you’re away from home, you can pick up right where you left off on your PC when you get back, with all your characters, dinos, and base progress intact. All paid DLC and in-game cosmetic purchases will also carry across platforms linked to your account. You only have to buy skins, expansion packs, or battle passes once, and you can use them on any platform you play on. I’ve had so many friends quit the original Ark after switching from PC to console and losing hundreds of hours of progress and paid DLC, so this change alone makes the sequel worth the wait for a lot of long-time fans. You don’t have to do any complicated setup to enable cross-progression either: just link all your platform accounts to your Studio Wildcard account before launch, and your progress will sync automatically every time you log out of one platform and log into another.
Potential Limitations Of Ark 2 Crossplay You Should Know
While crossplay support is far more robust than the original game, there are a few small limitations you should keep in mind to avoid disappointment on launch day. First, PlayStation 5 players won’t have access to crossplay until the timed exclusivity window ends, so if most of your friends play on PS5, you might want to wait for that launch instead of buying the game on Xbox or PC early. Second, community-run unofficial servers can choose to disable crossplay entirely if their admin wants to restrict their server to players on a single platform. Competitive PvP servers may offer optional input-based matchmaking to level the playing field between controller and mouse/keyboard players. If you turn this setting on, you’ll only be matched with other players using the same input type as you, which is a great option for controller players who don’t want to go up against faster, more precise mouse and keyboard aim in PvP fights. Heavily modded servers are another exception: most high-mod PC servers won’t be accessible to console players, since console platforms restrict the types of mods that can be used to keep performance stable. Always check the server description before joining to confirm if crossplay is enabled for that specific server. Even with these small limitations, the answer to will Ark 2 be crossplay is still far more positive than most fans expected when the sequel was first announced.
At the end of the day, the answer to will Ark 2 be crossplay is a resounding yes, with more cross-platform features than almost any other survival game on the market right now. The dev team has clearly listened to community feedback and fixed the biggest pain point from the original game, making it easier than ever to play with all your friends no matter what platform they prefer. If you want to be ready for launch, take two minutes now to link your existing platform accounts to your Studio Wildcard account, so cross-progression and crossplay work seamlessly the second you boot up the game for the first time. I’m already looking forward to joining my tribe mates who play on Xbox while I’m on PC, no more jumping through hoops or buying extra copies of the game just to get our whole group in the same server.