Key keywords: Fortnite Next Season 2026, Fortnite Runners Season, Summer Game Fest 2026 (SGF 2026), Ben Starr, Epic Games battle royale, Fortnite exclusive season reveal, Fortnite movement-focused gameplay, Fortnite 2026 Battle Pass Epic Games has officially confirmed that Fortnite’s highly anticipated next season, titled *Runners*, will receive its global first reveal during the 2026 edition of Summer Game Fest, with beloved actor and long-time Fortnite fan Ben Starr serving as the official host for the announcement segment. Starr, best known for his award-winning performance as Clive Rosfield in *Final Fantasy XVI*, previously collaborated with Epic Games as a guest voice actor and playable skin in Fortnite’s 2025 “Fantasy Realms” season, earning widespread praise from players for his enthusiastic engagement with the game’s community. Scheduled to take place on June 12, 2026, at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, Summer Game Fest’s Fortnite segment will run for 18 minutes, featuring exclusive first-look footage, hands-on gameplay demos, and a live Q&A with Starr and Epic Games’ lead creative director Donald Mustard. People familiar with the reveal shared that the *Runners* season is built entirely around parkour, free-running, and high-speed traversal mechanics, marking a major shift from recent Fortnite seasons that prioritized combat-focused gimmicks and cross-media collabs with little gameplay innovation. The season’s new map will include 7 dedicated free-running zones, ranging from neon-lit urban skyscraper clusters to winding canyon trails, with custom physics that let players chain wall runs, double jumps, zip-line grinds, and momentum-based slides to navigate the map up to 60% faster than in the current season. The reveal will also showcase the full *Runners* Battle Pass lineup, which includes 12 exclusive movement-focused cosmetic items, limited-time cross-over skins tied to popular parkour and racing IPs, and a new competitive game mode where players race across the map to complete objectives for in-game rewards. Epic Games has already dropped subtle teases for the season across its official social media channels over the past two weeks, including short clips of blurred parkour gameplay, a 2-second audio clip of Starr’s voice saying “On your mark,” and a countdown timer on the Fortnite main menu that ends on the day of the SGF reveal. The *Runners* season is set to launch globally across all platforms 7 days after the SGF announcement, with pre-load options available for all players 48 hours before the official go-live time.