Tarkov Kord Breach: What Season 1 Actually Changes in 2026

On August 3, 2026, Escape from Tarkov shipped patch 1.1.0.0 and with it Kord Breach, the game’s first season. It is the largest change since the 1.0 launch and it rewrites what “a fresh start” means in Tarkov — but it does not touch the character most players care about.

The seasons system

Each season introduces its own rules, mechanics, rewards, and progression changes. A Seasonal Character lives on separate servers and is completely independent from your PvP Zone and PvE Zone characters. When a new season begins, that seasonal character is reset, and the cycle restarts. The season also ships its own task line, KORD BREACH, which follows the Black Division storyline and unlocks trade offers for valuable items and the new weapon for players who complete it.

Forced wipes are gone

The traditional Tarkov wipe — where every player’s PMC, stash, and trader rep reset together — was last seen at the 1.0 launch on November 15, 2025. Since then, permanent PvP and PvE profiles persist indefinitely. Nothing you built on your main is deleted unless you choose a voluntary Prestige reset. The page on whether a wipe is coming covers this in detail.

Three profiles, not one

Patch 1.1.0.0 splits access into three profiles:

• Permanent PvP — your existing character, untouched by the season.
• PvE — also untouched, and there is no PvE seasonal mode.
• Seasonal PvP (Kord Breach) — an optional fresh-start character built under the season’s ruleset. If you ignore the season entirely, your main account is exactly as you left it. If you want the old fresh-start feeling, you create a Seasonal Character and jump into that pool.

What everyone feels anyway

The seasonal systems are opt-in, but the economy rebalance in the same patch is not. Trader prices, buyback values, and the flea fee all shifted for every mode, which the economy changes page breaks down. Between the seasonal character rules and the three-profile split, Kord Breach changes the game without resetting it.