When will Dota 2 patch 7.40 be released? – Expected date

Two months have passed since patch 7.39e was released, and it barely affected the meta - only minor tweaks. A full-scale update hasn’t appeared in the game for about half a year, so community expectations for 7.40 are at their peak. Judging by Valve’s recent activity, the major update likely won’t take long, and everything points to a mid-December release.

Possible release date of patch 7.40

Over the past four seasons, developers have released a major patch before the end of the year only once - usually big updates arrive in the following year. However, this time several factors suggest that the update may indeed appear in December 2025:

• active work on the staging server — new changes appear almost every week
• the start of DreamLeague Season 27, which traditionally coincides with patch releases

DreamLeague has become a magnet for major updates over the last two years. During three of the previous four seasons, Valve released new patches right in the middle of the tournament. One of them even dropped before the playoffs of DreamLeague Season 23, without waiting for the event to end.

DreamLeague Season 27 runs from 10.12.2025 to 21.12.2025, with playoffs starting on the 17th. Valve has never pushed updates during the decisive final days, so the possible release windows are December 10–11 and December 15–16.

Considering Valve’s habits and the need for quick hotfixes, the most likely date is December 16. It's a Tuesday and marks the end of the group stage - an ideal moment for a major update.

What may appear in patch 7.40:

• release of new heroes - the Frog Bard, already available on the test server and Arjun, who was also referenced in test files
• a New Year event or seasonal treasure chests
• major balance adjustments and a global hero rework
• an update to the pool of neutral items
• new items and changes to existing ones
• reworks to the map and the in-game economy

DreamLeague Season 27 will take place from 10.12.2025 to 21.12.2025 with 24 teams participating. The tournament prize pool will be $1,000,000. You can follow the championship in detail in the report.

Earlier, Cyberscore reported that the average player count in Dota 2 has risen to its highest level in the past six years.