The next ARC Raiders Expedition is not coming until early 2027. The 5th Expedition window closed on September 29, 2026, and Embark has paused the whole system to rework it, so as of October there is nothing to sign up for. An Expedition is ARC Raiders’ voluntary wipe: you build a Caravan, send your Raider out of the Rust Belt for good, restart from level 1, and keep a set of permanent rewards (stash space, skill points, cosmetics) plus stacking temporary buffs. Below: exactly what resets and what stays, the rewards from all five Expeditions in one table, what carries over during the pause, and who should actually plan for the next departure.
Everything here is checked against Embark’s Expedition announcements and Live Update 1.45.0, with Frozen Trail landing October 8, last checked September 2026.
What an Expedition actually is
An Expedition works like prestige in other shooters, and nobody can force you onto one. Embark said so from the start. In its original design note the studio explained it does not do mandatory wipes because they don’t “respect the investment of those players who do not have as much time to play,” and offered a voluntary reset instead. The feature unlocks at level 20 as the Expedition Project.
Each cycle has four steps:
- Build the Caravan, a multi-stage project (Foundation, Core Systems, Framework, Outfitting, then a Load stage). For the first Expedition that meant 150 Metal Parts and 200 Rubber Parts just for the Foundation, and a Load stage asking for 250,000 Coins of combat items, 100,000 of survival items, 180,000 of provisions and 300,000 of materials, per the ARC Raiders wiki’s Expedition page. You can work on it between windows.
- Sign up during the window. A finished Caravan does not count as signing up. That rule has cost a lot of people a departure.
- Complete the challenge. Since the third Expedition this has been a damage challenge within the window.
- Depart. Everyone who signed up leaves together when the window closes.
Embark also drew one line it has never crossed: a reset “should never give a player a power or combat advantage over anyone who has not completed a reset.” The rewards are about convenience and cosmetics, not stats that win fights.
What you lose and what you keep
You lose everything your Raider earned by playing and keep everything your account earned. Embark’s first departure post listed the reset plainly: “your Skill Tree, Level, Stash, Workshop, Crafting Abilities, and Blueprints.” Your stash contents, and your Coins, count toward the Caravan and the stash-value rewards, then leave with your old Raider.
| Resets on departure | Survives departure |
|---|---|
| Raider level | Cosmetics (earned or bought) and Raider Tokens |
| Skill tree and skill points from leveling | Permanent Expedition bonuses: extra stash space, bonus skill points |
| Stash and inventory (items count toward stash value first) | Codex entries |
| Workshop upgrades (workbenches back to level 1) | Unlocked map regions, and most onboarding is skipped |
| Crafting abilities and learned blueprints | Trials, leaderboard position, Raider Deck progress |
| Quests (opt-in only since the 5th Expedition) | Trophy Display Project |
The quest change matters more than it looks. Until the 5th Expedition, departing meant replaying the whole quest line in order. Now you choose, and Embark promised another route to the Hullcracker Blueprint for anyone who skips the reset, since it was only obtainable through quests.
Expedition rewards, cycle by cycle
The headline rewards (stash space, skill points) are permanent. The rules for earning skill points changed three times in five cycles, which is why half the guides online are wrong. Here is every Expedition so far, from Embark’s announcement posts:
| Expedition | Window | Challenge | Skill points | Cosmetics | Stash total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | Dec 17-22, 2025 | Stash value | Up to 5 (1M Coins of value each) | Patchwork outfit, Scrappy Janitor Cap | +12 |
| 2nd | Feb 25 – Mar 1, 2026 | Stash value | Up to 5 (600k each, 3M for all 5) plus catch-up at 300k per missed point | Patchwork evolved, new Scrappy outfit | +24 |
| 3rd | Apr 28 – May 11, 2026 | Damage dealt (Last Call added) | Up to 5 by damage, plus catch-up | Full Patchwork, Scrappy Turban | +36 |
| 4th | Jul 7-21, 2026 | Damage dealt | None from the challenge (Mystery Rewards instead); catch-up only | Zenith outfit, part 1 | +48 |
| 5th | Sep 8-29, 2026 | Damage dealt, no Last Call | Catch-up only, capped at 15 total | Complete Zenith outfit | +60 (cap) |
The damage challenge has used the same five steps since the third Expedition. On the third it paid skill points; on the 4th and 5th each step paid a Mystery Reward (Blueprints plus 150 Raider Tokens per objective). The Mystery Reward Blueprints are temporary and reset on your next departure.
| Total damage in the window | Reward step |
|---|---|
| 5,000 | 1 |
| 10,000 | 2 |
| 30,000 | 3 |
| 50,000 | 4 |
| 100,000 | 5 |
The wiki notes that 8,000 to 10,000 damage is achievable in a single very good round, so the first two steps are an evening and the last one is a project.
The consecutive buffs
On top of the permanent rewards, each departure gives temporary account buffs that stack if you go on consecutive Expeditions, capped at three levels. The XP steps, the first two Scrappy steps and the first repair step come from Embark’s posts; the rest are the wiki’s figures:
| Buff | Level 1 | Level 2 | Level 3 (cap) |
|---|---|---|---|
| XP boost | 5% | 10% | 15% |
| Scrappy materials | 6% | 12% | 18% |
| Repair buff | 10% | 20% | 30% |
Normally the buffs expire if you skip the next Expedition. The pause changes that: Embark says “any of the consecutive buffs you have earned will persist so no progress is lost” until Expeditions return.
The pause: what happens until early 2027
Everything you earned survives the pause. Your half-built Caravan does not. Embark’s 5th Expedition post is explicit: “The fifth Expedition will be the last one until early 2027, when Expeditions will return with major improvements.” The reasons it gave were “the tight departure windows, the reward structure, and accessibility for new players.”
- Caravans reset. Any partially completed Caravan was replaced with Ermal Vouchers of equal value, usable on Ermal offers or sellable for Coin.
- Buffs persist through the pause.
- If you finished all five, the Zenith outfit is fully unlocked.
- There is no date yet. Embark said it would share details of the rework; check its news page before you plan around anything.
At Gamescom, executive producer Aleksander Grøndal told PCGamesN: “Was the system perfect? No, probably not,” and then, “Maybe we’ll scrap the whole system altogether. That is on the table, too.” So the 2027 version may look very different from the five cycles above, or may not be an Expedition at all.
That also means the post-departure grind is now a fixed, known cost for anyone who went out on September 29: fresh level, empty workbench, no blueprints. If you’d rather not rebuild your blueprint list one raid at a time, our ARC Raiders blueprint farm service handles it while you play the parts you like.
Should you plan for the next Expedition?
That depends almost entirely on how many permanent rewards you still have to collect. You get a bigger stash and more skill points; you pay for them with your blueprints, your workbenches and every item in your stash. Over on r/ArcRaiders the recurring worry is being “permanently behind” if you skip one. You aren’t: the stash cap is 60 and the skill point cap is 15, and the catch-up system has let players reclaim missed points from their second Expedition onward.
| You are… | Plan for 2027? | Why |
|---|---|---|
| A newer Raider under level 20 | Wait and see | You can’t start the project yet, and Embark named new-player accessibility as a target of the rework |
| Level 75 with nothing left to chase | Yes | A fresh Raider with extra stash and skill points is the best endgame loop the game has had |
| Missing stash slots or skill points (under 60 / 15) | Yes | Those are the permanent rewards, and the pause keeps your buffs alive |
| Already capped at 60 stash and 15 skill points | Only for cosmetics | The remaining rewards are cosmetic and temporary; the reset costs you the same |
| A collector whose fun is a full blueprint list | Probably not | Blueprints reset, and rebuilding them is the longest part of the restart |
| A player with little weekly playtime | Only if the new windows are longer | Tight windows were Embark’s own first complaint; wait for the new rules |
How to prepare your stash for early 2027
Don’t hoard for a system that might not exist in its current form. The rules will almost certainly change, so play the months until the next window for your current Raider, not for the Caravan. From watching our own team and clients restart after departures, here is what actually helps:
- Keep your value in Coins and high-value items. Stash value has counted toward skill points (and still does for catch-up, at 300,000 per missed point). High-value items and Coins count; forty stacks of junk just clog your 60 slots.
- Stockpile common crafting materials anyway. Metal Parts, Rubber Parts, Wires and Batteries were all on the first Caravan’s list, and they are useful Topside even if the Caravan never returns.
- Use the Ermal Vouchers. They are equal-value compensation for your old Caravan. Spend them or sell them, don’t let them rot.
- Plan your post-reset kit now: know which weapons you’ll craft first on a fresh Raider; our weapon tier list and loadout meta are the shortlist we start from.
- Watch Frozen Trail’s Skill Tree rework. It lands October 8, and it will change how your existing bonus skill points get spent.
A pattern we saw after every departure this year: the week after the Caravan leaves, blueprint requests spike, because players find out that level 1 with an empty workbench feels a lot longer the fifth time. Plan for that week before you sign up, not after, and keep our ARC Raiders blueprint farming guide open for the rebuild.
The case against Expeditions
The system has not worked for most players, and Embark says so itself. Five cycles in, the rules changed on nearly every one (stash value, then cheaper stash value, then damage, then Mystery Rewards instead of skill points). GamesRadar+ reported that only a fairly small share of players take part. The tight windows punished anyone with a normal job, the quest replay was tedious enough that Embark made it optional, and the temporary Mystery Reward Blueprints vanish at your next departure. Our own table has a weakness too: it describes a system Embark is openly rebuilding, so read it as history and a baseline for 2027.
Frequently asked questions
When is the next ARC Raiders Expedition?
Early 2027. The 5th Expedition window closed on September 29, 2026, and Embark paused the system to rework it. No exact date has been announced yet.
Can I still complete the Expedition in ARC Raiders?
Not until Expeditions return. The 5th Expedition had no Last Call, and during the pause any partially completed Caravan was converted into Ermal Vouchers of equal value.
What do you lose when you go on an Expedition?
Your level, skill tree, stash and items, workshop upgrades, crafting abilities and learned blueprints. Quests reset only if you opt in (since the 5th Expedition). Cosmetics, Raider Tokens, Codex entries, unlocked maps, Trials and your permanent Expedition bonuses stay.
Are Expeditions mandatory in ARC Raiders?
No. Expeditions are fully voluntary. Embark built them as an alternative to forced wipes so players with less time never lose progress they didn’t choose to give up.
What are the ARC Raiders Expedition rewards?
Permanently, +12 stash space per Expedition up to 60 and bonus skill points up to 15, plus an outfit per cycle (Patchwork for the first three, Zenith for the 4th and 5th). Temporarily, stacking XP, Scrappy materials and repair buffs, capped at three levels.
Do I lose my Expedition buffs during the pause?
No. Embark confirmed that consecutive buffs persist through the pause until Expeditions return in early 2027.
The Expedition trades your Raider’s progress for permanent stash space, skill points and cosmetics. The last window closed on September 29, the system is paused until early 2027, and the rules are probably changing. Your buffs survive the pause and your Caravan turned into Ermal Vouchers, so the only real decision today is how you spend the months in between. If you’d like help with that, from rebuilding blueprints after a departure to farming Coins and materials for the next Caravan, our raid help, loot farm or squad carry services pick up the grind on your schedule.
