The Witcher 3 Remastered release time, countdown clock, file size, and what’s new in today’s free update
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The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt already enjoyed a major “next-gen” update back in 2022, and today comes a new remastered version of the popular CD Projekt Red title. Like the next-gen upgrade, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered arrives as a completely free update, provided you already own the game, and launches on PC and consoles (PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch 2) later today.
CD Projekt Red executive producer Jakub Kutrzuba claims it’s “hard to go back” to the original after spending so much time with the remastered version, which ships with more than just a graphical upgrade. The remaster comes with improvements to animations, gameplay, enemy behavior, combat, and much more, aiming to bring it up to standard with a 2026 release.
When does The Witcher 3 Remastered release today?
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered will release globally on September 29 at 3 AM Pacific Time. We’ve put together a list of time zone conversions if you’re trying to figure out how that looks in your region. There’s also a countdown clock down below, which will disappear once it expires – so if you don’t see anything, then the update is already live.
Latest PC & Tech deals
- AMD Ryzenâ„¢ 9 9900X 12-Core - was $499 now $337
- iBUYPOWER Element Gaming PC - was $1,999 now $1,699
- LG 27GX700A-B 27-inch Ultragear- was $599 now $485
- Samsung SSD 9100 PRO 1TB - was $339 now $249
- HP OmniBook 5 16 inch - was $961 now $799
Prices correct as of September 21st, 2026.
- US Pacific (PDT):Â 3 AM
- US Eastern (EDT):Â 6 AM
- United Kingdom (BST):Â 11 AM
- Central Europe (CEST):Â 12 PM
- India (IST):Â 03:30 PM
- Singapore (SGT):Â 6 PM
- Japan (JST):Â 7 PM
- Sydney (AEST):Â 8 PM
- New Zealand (NZST):Â 11 PM
How big is The Witcher 3 Remastered update, and what’s new?
First things first: community and social media at CD Projekt Red, Marcin Momot, reveals that the PC version of the update will be around 45GB, though this may vary depending on your installed language packs. The PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions will also be ~45GB, while the Nintendo Switch 2 version is a little higher at ~50GB. It arrives on Switch 2 as a separate title (but still free for existing owners).
There is a long list of improvements to explore, so we can’t really go through every little detail, but the remastered update covers changes across visuals and rendering, gameplay, UI/UX, photo mode, accessibility, quality-of-life, modding, and bug fixes. On the PC side of things, support has been added for path tracing, ray-traced HairWorks, and modern upscaling/frame gen suites from Nvidia, AMD, and Intel, respectively: DLSS 4.5 (with Ray Reconstruction), FSR 4 (with Frame Generation and Anti-Lag 2), and XeSS 2.0 (with Frame Generation and Low Latency). The game already supported Nvidia-based frame gen before the update.
The game now has an “improved shading model” and texture and model updates based on the fan-made ‘HD Reworked Project,’ along with native DirectX 12 rendering. In terms of gameplay, the skill system has been rebalanced and is now organized into a skill tree (with skill points now reset), camera changes have been made to be more dynamic, with higher FOV while exploring, and much more.
CD Projekt Red has a full list of patch notes here if you want all the specifics, so we recommend checking it out. PC system requirements have also had a little makeover, but the game isn’t expected to be massively more demanding, and early tests on the Steam Deck show it still runs fine on Valve’s popular handheld.
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