Modern Warfare 4 and Warzone Season 1 goes live at midnight Eastern tonight, with two new Warzone maps, three multiplayer maps, a new DMZ zone, two Battle Pass weapons, and Warzone's debut on Nintendo Switch 2. Here is the full rundown and what to do first.

The first season of the Modern Warfare 4 era is hours away. Season 1 unlocks at 12:00 a.m. ET on Friday, November 6, which is 9:00 p.m. PT tonight, November 5, and 5:00 a.m. GMT, across all platforms at the same time. It is a big one: this is the update that fully integrates Modern Warfare 4 into Warzone, resets player levels across every mode, and moves the whole ecosystem off last gen hardware. Download the update early if you can. Midnight launches are not kind to slow connections.

Warzone: a new home in Korea

Warzone's new large scale Battle Royale map is Hajin, set on the Korean Peninsula and tied directly to the Modern Warfare 4 campaign. It is the first time Warzone has fought in South Korea. The map spans 13 major points of interest across both Koreas, from Hajin City's fortified downtown to the farmland around Imjin and locations over the border like Chang-san Air Base. Hajin also brings variable weather, from clear skies to fog and storms, and a brand new Gulag with two arena variants.

The new Resurgence map is Zodiac, a compact zone built around the DRC Advanced Systems drone factory in South Korea, developed by Beenox with Infinity Ward. Its ten points of interest include a double railway with moving trains, underground tunnels, and rooftops made for rotations. Launch modes cover Battle Royale and Resurgence, including Casual variants, plus Rally Point, Massive Resurgence and Loaded Resurgence. Two old friends return later in the season: Verdansk and Rebirth Island are both confirmed, but neither is there on day one.

Integration changes how the game plays, too. Season 1 brings a player level reset across Multiplayer, DMZ and Warzone, access to all 33 Modern Warfare 4 launch weapons with Weapon Prestige and Warzone Mastery Camos, Tactical Sprint for every Operator with no perk required, and the ability to drag a downed teammate while reviving them. New gear includes the Zipline Launcher field upgrade, which plants a zipline your whole squad can ride, the Grabber Drone, which can haul loot, fuel barrels and even downed teammates, and a new tier of Elite Perks. Your older gear carries forward as well: operators, skins and blueprints from Modern Warfare II through Black Ops 7 work in Warzone, with older guns living in a Legacy tab.

Warzone lands on Switch 2, and last gen is done

Season 1 also marks the launch of Warzone on Nintendo Switch 2, the first time the free to play game has been on a Nintendo system, with Hajin and Zodiac playable from day one. Going the other way, Warzone will no longer be playable on PlayStation 4 or Xbox One starting with Season 1. Progression carries over to a supported platform if you sign in with the same linked Activision account.

Multiplayer: three maps and the return of Grind

Multiplayer gets three 6v6 maps at launch. Backstab is a medium sized map set in a snowbound, wrecked town full of abandoned armor. Canyon fights through rock walls and a river around an ambushed convoy. And Shoot House returns in reimagined form, its three lane layout moved to North Korea in light snow, with the Junkyard, Center tunnels and Containers all present and accounted for. The Kill Block: Crash layout joins them, and the mode list adds the returning Grind alongside Drop Zone and Gauntlet 1v1. Mid season brings two more maps, the embassy fight Ministry and the factory and farmland of Overflow, with further maps still classified.

DMZ gets the X01 Black Site

DMZ expands to X01, a former GRANIT Arms black site on the northern edge of Hajin now held by North Korean forces. It is a smaller, denser zone in the spirit of Building 21, with new Orders, extraction challenges and events, and the Forward Operating Base gains new stations, including a Battle Pass and store point.

Weapons and the Battle Pass

Two new guns headline the season, both on the Battle Pass. The Cronen Osprey assault rifle arrives at tier 16, a 5.56 rifle whose Apex attachment, the Cronen Helix Mk. II, turns it into a double barrel receiver that fires on the trigger pull and the release. The CSG-35 SMG lands at tier 36, spitting 1,200 rounds a minute inside 20 meters, with an akimbo conversion for players who prefer volume over accuracy. Two more weapons arrive later in the season through events: the fully automatic JAK 12 shotgun and the ZLR Talonhawk melee axe.

The pass itself is a linear 100 tier track mixing free and premium rewards. Premium costs 1,100 COD Points, or 2,400 for the bundle, guarantees more than 50 rewards, and includes a catch up system that jumps a lapsed pass to the reward matching the current day of the season, up to day 50. BlackCell returns on top, led by the new operator XERO.

What to do first tonight

Our plan for the first session: update before midnight, drop into Hajin first while everyone is still learning its rotations, then run Shoot House to level the new Battle Pass guns, with the Cronen Osprey at tier 16 as the first real target. DMZ players should hit X01 early, before the loot routes are solved. And if you have a Switch 2, tonight is the night to find out how Warzone runs on it. Season 1 is the reset point for the whole year of Modern Warfare 4. See you in Hajin.

Sources

Call of Duty Blog: Warzone Season 1, Everything You Need to Know