Today, Funcom announced Conan Exiles Enhanced, a free upgrade that brings the game from Unreal Engine 4 to Unreal Engine 5. Conan Exiles Enhanced will launch on the game's eighth anniversary: May 5, 2026.
The upgraded version was developed in collaboration with Inflexion Games, the studio behind the survival game Nightingale. Conan Exiles Enhanced introduces four specific rendering improvements:
- Lumen Global Illumination - UE5's dynamic real-time lighting system
- Nanite Geometry - virtualized micropolygon geometry for highly detailed environments
- Virtual Shadow Maps - high-resolution, detailed shadows
- Improved Terrain - reworked ground geometry and surface quality
The Enhanced version targets smooth 60+ FPS across Low, Medium, High, and Ultra settings on most PCs, with Steam Deck support. Notably, despite the graphics improvements, the client size has been dramatically reduced from 120GB to just 40GB.
But there's more: the Exiled Lands and Isle of Siptah are now one continuous world, accessible with the same character via teleport. Multiplayer servers can host both maps simultaneously. Of course, Isle of Siptah still requires ownership of that DLC.
Conan Exiles Enhanced also features a revamped user interface with cleaner menus and improved navigation. Crafting now pulls ingredients from nearby storage and follower inventories, eliminating the need to carry everything yourself. Character customization has been expanded, featuring an enhanced "endowment" slider. Several popular Conan Exiles mods will be compatible at launch, and the Mod Development Kit has been refreshed. Moreover, this new version lets players maintain and switch between multiple single player characters per account, whereas Conan Exiles was limited to just one single player character per save.
It's worth noting that Conan Exiles Enhanced will debut on PC. Not only are there no current plans for a console version, but this enhanced release will debut only on Steam, with the Epic Games Store and Windows Store left behind.
This new version also adds NVIDIA DLSS Super Resolution, Frame Generation, Multi Frame Generation, and Reflex support.
Epic Games Store and Windows Store players will simply remain on UE4 by default; Funcom is calling this version Conan Exiles Legacy going forward. No action is needed from those players, but they should be aware that Legacy carries significant limitations: no official servers, no future major updates, and critically, the Bazaar will be disabled, meaning Crom Coins will no longer be valid on it. Funcom recommends spending any remaining Crom Coins before May 5.
Steam players, on the other hand, may choose to remain on Legacy by selecting the option in the Funcom Launcher, though there are some caveats: official server players must act before May 4th at 15:00 UTC, when all official PC servers will be brought down and migrated to UE5. Any character still on an official server at that point will be permanently updated to UE5 with no way to revert. To avoid this, players should use the Server Transfer Tool before the deadline to transfer their character off the official server.
When it comes to the save migration, Exiled Lands players on official or private servers can easily transfer their characters, bases, followers, and inventory to UE5. Isle of Siptah players face a harder transition. Because the island has been physically merged into the Exiled Lands (requiring a coordinate change), Isle of Siptah bases cannot be preserved in the UE5 update. Funcom recommends dismantling your base and storing materials in your followers' inventories before the transition. After the update, players will be dropped at a spawn point in the Exiled Lands and can travel back to the Isle of Siptah to rebuild.
Conan Exiles Enhanced celebrates 15 million players and a strong legacy of eight years of support, with 45 major updates, 69 square kilometers of land across 13 biomes and 23 dungeons, 24 unique building sets, 1,075 building pieces, 1,731 armor pieces, 1,350 weapons, 1,128 decorations, and 7 religions and avatars. It's also a way for Funcom to refresh its most successful game to date, while the new Dune Awakening struggles to retain an audience (it has just pivoted to PvE-first, since most of its players only engage with PvE content).
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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