ARC Raiders free weekend: Frozen Trail times, what's new

ARC Raiders is free to play for four days this week. From Thursday, October 8 at 09:00 UTC until Monday, October 12 at 08:00 UTC, anyone on Steam, Xbox Series X|S or PlayStation 5 can play the full game without buying it, Embark Studios says. The free window starts the same day as Frozen Trail, which Embark calls its "biggest update since launch": a snowy new map called Pendola Pass, four new enemies, new weapons and gadgets, player bases and a new progression system. If you would rather just buy it, the game is half price on Steam right now, at $19.99 instead of $39.99, until October 8.

ARC Raiders free weekend start and end times

Embark's announcement on arcraiders.com gives one global window: October 8, 09:00 UTC to October 12, 08:00 UTC. In local time, the free period opens at 2:00 a.m. PT / 5:00 a.m. ET on Thursday, 10:00 a.m. in the UK (BST), 11:00 a.m. in central Europe (CEST), 2:30 p.m. in India (IST) and 6:00 p.m. in Japan. It closes on Monday, October 12 at 1:00 a.m. PT / 4:00 a.m. ET, 9:00 a.m. BST, 10:00 a.m. CEST, 1:30 p.m. IST and 5:00 p.m. in Japan. Polygon's report lists the same 5 a.m. to 4 a.m. ET window.

It covers all three platforms the game is sold on: Steam on PC, Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5. Embark says free play "will grant access to the full ARC Raiders game", so there is no cut-down trial map or level cap. You still need an internet connection and an Embark ID account (13+), as with the paid game.

One useful detail for new players: if you team up with a friend who has already unlocked Pendola Pass, you can go straight into the new map with them instead of working your way there first.

What's new in Frozen Trail

Frozen Trail lands on October 8. Embark's First Look post sets it in Pendola Pass, an icy old Italian village and transport hub beyond the mountains around the Rust Belt, where one of the giant Emperor machines has fallen. The map has a supermarket, a town square, an observatory and a buried train depot, plus "flash freezes" that sweep through the valley and force you to find shelter.

There are four new enemies. The Frigate is a huge ARC ship patrolling the crash site that players can board and fight through, with other Raiders competing for the same loot. The Bully is an aggressive four-legged machine that charges straight at you. The Skulker is the opposite: it hides at the edge of your vision and ambushes you. The Hydra is a three-part stacked turret found on the Frigate that can take on a whole squad.

New gear includes the Stiletto, a cheap light-ammo battle rifle for long range, and the Bantam, a heavy-ammo snub-nosed revolver that is accurate from the hip. There is a Grappling Hook for climbing and swinging across gaps, a Tether Launcher that wires two points together to pin enemies in place, and a Yank Grenade that pulls a target towards it when it goes off. Embark is also adding a working in-game camera with zoom, focus and a selfie mode, two new instruments (a harmonica and a banjo), and weapon stencils for custom gun designs.

Outposts, Amplified Weapons and the new Reward Pass

The bigger long-term changes are for regular players. The Outpost is an extension of your Raider Den: a base between the Rust Belt and the mountains that you can customise with modules and furniture. Its Research Workstation unlocks deeper weapon upgrades, and when fully upgraded it opens Amplified Weapons, a fifth quality level for 15 guns that adds a branching set of upgrades. Embark's examples are a fully automatic Burletta, a Renegade with a scope and a Rattler with incendiary rounds and a 64-round magazine. The update also reworks the skill tree and adds new quests and a new map condition.

Frozen Trail also replaces Raider Decks with Reward Passes. The Frozen Trail Pass has 60 levels. Its free track includes all the new base outfits, cosmetics, new weapons, gadgets and items, and up to 200 Raider Tokens (the game's premium currency). The Premium track adds outfit variants, exclusive weapon stencils and hairstyles, and up to 1,150 Raider Tokens. It costs 1,150 Raider Tokens, so finishing it earns that back, and Embark says it contains nothing that affects gameplay. Everything from the old Raider Decks moves into a free Legacy Pass, and earlier progress is kept.

A Frozen Trail Collector Set DLC bundles the Premium Pass with a new outfit set, a weapon stencil, a hairstyle, a sofa for your Outpost, the only Banjo blueprint and 2,400 Raider Tokens. Its Steam page lists an October 8 release but showed no price when we checked on October 5 at 21:23 UTC.

ARC Raiders price: buy now or play free first?

When we checked Steam on October 5 at 21:23 UTC, ARC Raiders was 50% off: $19.99 for the standard game (normally $39.99) and $29.99 for the Deluxe Edition (normally $59.99), with Steam saying the offer ends October 8. Existing owners can upgrade to Deluxe for $9.99 (normally $19.99). Console store prices can differ, so check the PlayStation Store or Microsoft Store before you buy.

The catch is timing. The free window opens on the same day the Steam discount ends, so if you wait to try the game first you may miss the half-price deal. If you are fairly sure you will like it, buying at $19.99 before the sale ends is the cheaper option. If you are unsure, the free weekend costs nothing and Embark is clearly hoping you will buy at the end of it. Embark's post does not say whether progress from the free period carries over to a purchased copy, so do not assume it does.

On PC, Steam lists modest requirements. Minimum: Windows 10 64-bit, an Intel Core i5-6600K or AMD Ryzen 5 1600, 12 GB of RAM and an NVIDIA GTX 1050 Ti, AMD RX 580 or Intel Arc A380. Recommended: a Core i5-9600K or Ryzen 5 3600, 16 GB of RAM and an RTX 2070, RX 5700 XT or Arc B570.

Why Embark is doing this now

ARC Raiders dominated when it launched on October 30, 2025, but like most live-service games its audience has shrunk since. GamingBible, citing SteamDB, puts the Steam all-time peak at just under 482,000 players about 11 months ago. Steam's own player-count API showed 36,849 people playing at 21:22 UTC on October 5. GamesRadar+ notes the game still reaches tens of thousands of players on Steam every day. A free weekend on top of the largest update yet is a clear attempt to bring lapsed players back and pull in new ones.

More players also means more cheaters. Polygon raised the risk that a free trial "opens the floodgates". In a September 30 post, executive producer Aleks said permanent bans are now standard for anyone caught using known cheat programs, with "no warnings, no second chances", along with hardware bans and bans on accounts linked to a banned copy. Embark also says that keeping known teaming groups apart in solo matchmaking cut that behaviour by 85%, and that ruined raids fell from about 1 in 50 to 1 in 300.

What comes after the free weekend

Embark will release a Frozen Trail trailer on October 6. Chief creative officer Stefan Strandberg says it is the first to use full facial motion capture, so the character Celeste will now look much more like Diana Gardner, the actor who plays her, both in the trailer and in the game from Frozen Trail onwards.

The day after the free weekend ends, a PvE test begins. From October 13 to 20, players can switch between the normal mode, where other players can attack you, and a co-op mode with no player-versus-player damage. Embark says loot is worth less in the PvE sessions, some conditions (Night Raids, Hidden Bunker, Locked Gate and the Frigate) are left out, and the toggle will be removed after the test. It says the test is not a promise of a permanent PvE mode, but 51% of surveyed players said they wanted one.

The short version

If you have never played ARC Raiders, set a reminder for Thursday, October 8 at 09:00 UTC and try it free until Monday morning, ideally with a friend who already owns it so you can jump straight into Pendola Pass. If you already know you want it, the $19.99 Steam price before October 8 is the cheaper route. If you are a returning player, Frozen Trail is the biggest content drop the game has had, and the PvE test the following week may be the bigger draw if you never enjoyed fighting other players.