A lot happened in Hearthstone in 2025, and now everything hangs in a delicate balance: the stage has been set for the first expansion of 2026 to deliver, but will it? I know we’re always waiting for the next expansion to fix things, but this time, there are even better reasons than usual to expect greatness from next year, more so than what we got this year. Let’s take a deeper look at how Hearthstone spent 2025 on setting things up for the future more than on delivering great experiences.
Blizzard Solved Hearthstone’s Monetization
Hearthstone tightened up a lot over the past two years. Especially in 2024, Blizzard made many changes that hurt players and made the game more difficult to keep up with without spending money. 2025 was an easier time, as most of the pain had already been inflicted.
That said, monetization was Blizzard’s key focus this year as well. The first big feature of the year was the Arena revamp in spring, which made it more difficult to go infinite in Arena: you’d get more cards, but fewer opportunities to keep playing Arena specifically. The feedback was not good, and Blizzard ended up changing the rewards to make it easier to go infinite.
In doing so, Blizzard lowered the overall rewards to a point where playing Arena has a negative expected value compared to just buying packs from the shop for the first time in the history of the game: 295 gold worth of winnings expected for a 300 gold ticket purchase. As for going infinite in Arena, only 123 gold worth of the rewards come in gold and Tavern Tickets, so you need to cough up another 177 gold per run on average just to keep playing. It’s not good by any means.
However, the real breakthrough in monetization came later with the Darkmoon Faire Treasures. Adding a gambling mechanic together with a new cosmetic type (pets) turned out to be a major success. You get to randomly pull one of ten rewards in the Treasures, with each pull more expensive than the last one. The main prize looks attractive, but will usually cost you $160 (but it looks like they’re experimenting with “cheaper” versions – the current one costs $91 in total). While the first pull is free and the second one only costs $1-2, they get more expensive quickly, and they are heavily weighted so that your overall probability to get the main prize before the very last pull (at 9/10) is only about 10%.
The community was initially very upset about Darkmoon Faire Treasures, but the negative social media sentiment was not what the wallets said. Quite the contrary, Darkmoon Faire Treasures has most likely been the biggest financial success for Hearthstone in years (they were struggling with introducing new monetization options before). Consequently, Blizzard has kept pumping out new Treasures with sweet pets and Signature cards as rewards. And yeah, those pets are gorgeous. Are they $160 gorgeous? That’s a couple of AAA games, but you get to show them to your opponents in an online game. Gambling works.
Blizzard does not publish Hearthstone’s financial figures, but third-party sites show that the game earned more money on mobile in the West in 2025 than it did in 2024. Third-party figures are not fully reliable, but the game looks to be in a fine position revenue-wise.
Oh, and then there’s China. According to Sensor Tower figures for 2025, Hearthstone earned more money from China (iOS) than from the rest of the world combined (Android and iOS) at $27 million from China vs $25.3 million from the rest of the world. China is a huge market for the game, and it shows in their esports programs and marketing.
The Best Mini-Set of All Time
Gameplay-wise, 2025 started with a bang with the StarCraft mini-set. You can argue that the set was too dominant, but it was also a blast. Almost everyone had a lot of fun, until people got tired of it. A wonderful first cross-over event for the game, with gameplay that honored both Hearthstone and StarCraft.
The mini-set ended up being the target of many nerfs since, and it still remains a big part of the meta with cards like Ultralisk Cavern for Warlock and Colossus for Mage standing the test of time.
Note that the Starcraft mini-set is technically part of the 2024 Hearthstone sets, so it will rotate out of the Standard format this spring. If nothing changes from the past years, we have one more mini-set coming early in the year and then a Standard rotation with the first full expansion of 2026 coming in spring.
IP collaborations are a major trend in gaming at the moment, and Hearthstone’s competitors are also making great use of them. Magic: The Gathering has had too many to count, and Shadowverse is collaborating with Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End right now.
Blizzard does not want to share profits, but as part of Microsoft, they have access to a large portfolio of gaming IPs. Not to mention the Office Assistant (imagine a Clippy mini-set). Blizzard also has more things available from their own portfolio. I would be surprised if they did not make a Diablo mini-set in 2026. The Lord of Hatred expansion is coming for Diablo IV, and these cross-promotions do work.
The Forgotten Mode
Last year we said that Twist was down more than it was up, but it had a bright spot, with a very interesting, custom format (Heroes of Whizbang). This year, however? Nothing. We had two repeat seasons in January and February, but they sort of were a part of the game’s return to China. Twist originally released when the game was down out there, so they repeated the old seasons for them. They haven’t introduced any new formats since mid-2024.
The last official word we have about Twist is from January’s patch 31.4 patch notes, saying that it’s on hiatus and we’ll hear more about the mode in the future. I guess that’s the famous Blizzard’s “soon™” in action.
The mode is not officially shut down, but it doesn’t look great. Doubly so since it looks like Tavern Brawls have recently used some interesting ideas that would fit perfectly as Twist seasons (such as format where you can combine any two classes together). Will it join the likes of Duels, Classic and Mercenaries, or will Blizzard remember about it and share some positive news in 2026? Or maybe it will remain on the “hiatus” for another year?
What Is a Low Power Level, Anyway?
After the StarCraft mini-set, things were more stagnant when it came to gameplay. Into the Emerald Dream, The Lost City of Un’Goro, and Across the Timeways were all thematically successful, but received heavy criticism for their weak cards that didn’t affect the meta very much (especially Lost City, which at launch was probably the least impactful expansion in Hearthstone’s history).
The overall perception of the 2025 sets is that they are a soft reset of the power level of the game. Blizzard is very active in balancing the game nowadays, and they have worked tirelessly to avoid complete stagnation by changing almost 200 cards during this year, including tens of buffs to newly-released cards to make them more competitive.
One could ask if this tsunami of balance changes is too much. If you take a break from Hearthstone and come back, will any of your decks still work like they used to? Blizzard completely killed several decks in their balance patches this year: King Plush with no Charge? Arkonite Defense Crystal with no Taunt? Testing Dummy that does not hit face? I saw how all of these changes caught some players by surprise. While Blizzard has killed decks before (Grim Patron and Warsong Commander remember), they had avoided it lately, but no more.
With the first set of 2026, the sets from 2024 – including the Heroes of StarCraft mini-set – will rotate out of the Standard format. The baseline will be set much lower than it was a year ago, and the Hearthstone team should have plenty of space to deliver new experiences. With the monetization improvements in place, there should be no need to squeeze the player base for anything more. Everything is in place. If there was a grand plan, the first set of 2026 will be the time to reap the rewards. 2025 was spent setting up that moment. It is up to Blizzard to deliver.
This time last year I reflected that 2024 did not feel like a celebration of Hearthstone, not one that should have commemorated ten years of the game. I was not prepared for the surprise of 2025, which I’m not sure how to place. 2025’s sets felt a lot less goofy, and I could see an argument for Year of the Raptor returning to Hearthstone’s roots as a collection of “What if?” inspirations instead of what Whizbang’s Workshop and Perils in Paradise tried to be. But somehow, 2025 felt characterised more of what Hearthstone got wrong than what they got right. You could not have told me or anyone that 2025 would bring a set that felt more disappointing and reviled than United in Stormwind, and here we are.
I do wonder how, in an alternate timeline when 2025’s sets were introduced in 2024 instead, celebrating the heritage of Un’goro and Chromie’s multiversal adventures, would have been better received to celebrate the 10th anniversary? Someone else with a social media following and more of a Hearthstone math brain than mine might be able to come up with something. Old Guardian has said it far better than I could have, in far more hopefulness. I still enjoy the game, unironically. It is on Blizzard to follow through the decisions they’ve made to see them pay off.
Thank you, Stonekeep and Old Guardian, for continuing to be a valued resource all these years. See you in 2026.