Warhammer 40K 11th Edition: Release Date, Rules Changes, Box Set, and Latest Updates

Games Workshop announced the newest edition of Warhammer 40,000 at their Preview Show at Adepticon 2026 with the new Armageddon box set. Warhammer 40,000 11th edition is on the way and will land in June 2026.

If you are looking for the latest information on the release date, starter set, rules changes, codex support, new models, and what Warhammer 40K 11th Edition could mean for competitive play, you’ll find it here.

I’ll keep this article updated as new information is confirmed, so check back regularly as more details are revealed in the lead-up to launch.

Let’s get into it!

Last updated: May 5th, 2026

Latest update: Armageddon Box Set contents revealed, new special rules added for Fire Overwatch and Snap Shooting

What is Warhammer 40K 11th Edition?

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition is a core update to the ruleset for the Warhammer 40K tabletop miniatures game. Currently Warhammer 40K is in its 10th edition. The new 11th edition will replace the current 10th edition framework with fresh rules that will change the gameplay experience. Warhammer 40K 11th Edition will release in June of 2026 with the Armageddon box set featuring the iconic forces of the Space Marines versus the xenos alien Orks.

Warhammer 40,000 – 11th Edition Box Set: Armageddon

First up, is the new Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition box set, Armageddon which pits the forces of the Space Marines against an Ork Waaaagh. Armageddon has long been an established battlezone in the Warhammer 40,000 universe and the narrative shapes around an incoming invasion across the war-torn battlefields of one of the settings most nefarious planetary systems.

Armageddon Box Set Models: Space Marines vs Orks

The new box set will feature new Space Marines models with build variations that allow using some of the older Space Marine helmet options with the new Primaris “true-scale” marines. Meanwhile the Orks are getting new models as well.

We don’t know exactly what’s in the box as of this writing or what the new models will be exactly, but there will be new options available in the Armageddon box set for Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition. As new information about the box is released, I’ll keep this section updated.

The Vanguard Veterans kit is getting a new upgrade in Armageddon and 11th Edition with a new Jump Pack and updated poses.

Updated: May 5th, 2026:

The new Armageddon box set for Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition will feature 23 Space Marines models and 38 Orks:

Space Marines Models:

• Captain with Shield and Relic Blade
• Librarian
• Chaplain with Jump Pack
• Ancient
• 10 Intercessors
• 5 Vanguard Veterans
• 3 Eradicators with Heavy Bolters
• 1 Land Speeder

Orks Models:

• Ork Warboss
• Bigboss
• Weirdboy
• Banner Nob
• Painboy
• 20 Ork Boyz
• 10 Gretchin
• 1 Wartrakk
• 1 Big Mek Dakkarig

Armageddon Box Set Rules and Mission Cards

The Armageddon Box Set will contain the Core Rules, Datasheets for all the units, and two mission decks; the Dominatus Armageddon Campaign Mission Deck and the Chapter Approved 2026-2027 Mission Deck

The Dominatus Mission Deck is designed to allow players to create and manage campaigns quickly and easily in the Armageddon setting.

The Chapter Approved 2026-2027 Mission Deck features all the Primary and Secondary Missions along with Deployment cards to play matched play competitive games of Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition.

Warhammer 40,000 – 11th Edition – Trailer

In the new Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition cinematic trailer we see a Blood Angels Chaplain leading a force of Space Marines against a legion of Orks. The Orks feature what appears to be a new Weirdboy as well as a new tank option that we will likely see in the game upon release.

Warhammer 40,000 – 11th Edition – Rules and Gameplay Info

Based on the preview this is what we know so far about the changes forthcoming in the new edition of Warhammer 40,000

Updated May 5, 2026

Army Codexes from 10th edition will still be usable in Warhammer 40,000 11th edition. We are not shifting to an “index” edition at the start. Your Faction Codex will still work until it gets an update for 11th Edition.

New rules for Detachments. Detachments will still work in Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition just as they have in the current edition. Additionally you’ll have the option to combine detachment abilities as well to customize your forces. There will be 70 new Detachments released across the factions at the launch of the game as well.

No more “objective circles” in Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition. Instead of using circular markers to note objectives, players will fight over key positions and terrain features which will become the “objectives” to score your mission points. This makes terrain much different than the current 10th edition as well.

“Stay Hidden” allows you to deploy your forces and not be immediately targeted by enemy ranged shooting attacks. This new rule will allow you to deploy forces in terrain features or otherwise in visible positions and remain untargetable by enemy units that remain more than 15″ away until they make a ranged attack. This is a new and interesting rule which adds a new layer of tactical flexibility where you can deploy and stage shooting elements to threaten areas of the battlefield while remaining untargetable to the enemy. More info to come later on how this rule will work in games.

Combat is changing in Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition. No longer will you have to declare a target for a Charge move and then roll to see if your Charge is successful, In the new edition, you’ll roll the Charge roll first and then pick your targets within range. This change is designed to allow combat armies to do what they are designed to do without being “left in the open” due to a failed Charge roll. Pile-in and Consolidation moves are changing now as well and will be “combined” but we don’t know exactly how that will work.

No more “stratagem stacking.” Players will no longer be able to stack multiple stratagems on the same unit in the same phase. This means that, for example, you cannot use Armour of Contempt on a unit and the Command Re-roll stratagem on that same unit in the same phase.

Leaders regain benefits when their unit is destroyed. In Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition, Leaders attached to units will be able to retain benefits even after their bodyguard unit is destroyed. So, for example, a Chaplain will retain his +1 to Wound even when no longer leading a unit.

Combat disembark. If a Transport is within engagement range of an enemy unit, the embarked units will be able to get out and pile straight into combat although they will be battleshocked when doing so.

New Mission system. It was termed “forced disposition” in the preview, but essentially both players will have values associated with their chosen Detachment that will determine what their Primary mission will be when paired against the opponent. This may include “holding ground” or “destroying enemy units.”

Changes to cover. Instead of modifying a model’s armor save, cover will now impose a -1 To Hit penalty on ranged attacks. Also, Monster and Vehicle units will no longer benefit from cover simply for being within a terrain’s footprint, but may still receive it from intervening terrain features in the footprint.

Deep Strike and Strategic Reserve units will be able to come in more than 8” from enemy models as opposed to 9” but will still require a 9 on a Charge Roll to successfully charge those units. This really gives a huge buff to most Melta weapons as they can arrive from reserves and be within “Melta range” for extra damage on the targets.

Fire Overwatch remains in 11th Edition as a 1 CP Stratagem however now it triggers at the end of the opponent’s Movement phase instead of during the Movement phase or Charge phase. Further, units who fire Overwatch make a special kind of attack called “Snap Shooting” as described in the image below:

The Warhammer App is getting an update. The app will now feature a scoring tracker for your games and will also allow you to see your opponent’s datasheets during games as well. There will also be extended language support for French, German, Spanish, Chinese, Japanese and Korean languages in the app.

More to come later. In the coming weeks we will get more previews and sneak peaks into Warhammer 40,000 11th Edition and I will keep this post updated to reflect everything we’ve been given as it comes.

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition: How Army Building Works

You’ll still be able to use your 10th Edition Codex and all the Detachments contained in Warhammer 40K 11th Edition until your faction gets an updated version. Further, on release of 11th Edition there will be 70 new Detachments to choose from.

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition: Using Detachment Points

We already noted that you’ll be able to mix and match multiple different Detachments to customize your armies. This will be done through the process of using Detachment Points which will change depending on the size of your games. For the standard Strike Force format for 2,000 points, that means you’ll have 3 “Detachment Points” and each different Detachment you can play with your Faction will have a total number of Detachment Points assigned to it. The more broad in scope your Detachment and the more units that can use its benefits, the more Detachment Points it will cost. While other Detachments that have more limited units that are effected by rules and abilities may cost less. This will give you the flexibility to build Detachments that are more thematic and flavorful with units that can use multiple benefits in your games.

New Rules for Enhancements

Some Enhancements will be noted with a new tag called “Upgrades.” These Enhancements will be able to be taken on non-Character models up to three times per Army (paying the associated points cost for each) while only taking up a single choice in terms of your total Enhancements limitation. In other words, you could assign an Enhancement marked as an “Upgrade” to three different non-Character units in your army, and still have room to use three more Enhancements in your list in a Strike Force battle.

New Rules for Characters: Leader and Support

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition will introduce the new “Support” designation for some Characters. These Characters can be attached to units along with another Character. Similar to how the Lieutenant or Apothecary can be attached along with a Captain to a unit in Space Marines.

You will designate what Characters will be attached to which units in the list building phase now, instead of before each battle. While normal Leader characters can choose to remain unattached to units in list building, Support Characters will be required to be attached to a bodyguard unit in list building.

Force Dispositions in Warhammer 40K 11th Edition

Force Dispositions are a new concept in Warhammer 40K 11th Edition and will be determined by the Detachment(s) you choose. There are five in total and before the battle, you will compare your army’s Force Disposition with your opponent’s to determine the mission you will play and how that mission will be scored.

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition: How Missions Work

As noted above, your army will have one of five “Force Dispositions” which indicates how your army interacts in games of Warhammer 40K matched play. You will compare your Force Disposition with that of your opponent to determine the Primary mission you will play.

This means there will be a possible 5 different mission interactions for your army to play depending on your opponent’s army choices.

In the example above, if your Force Disposition was Purge the Foe and you were paired against an opponent whose Force Disposition was Disruption, then you’d play the “Punishment” mission. In contrast, your opponent’s Primary mission will be different from your own with different conditions for scoring Victory Points for Primary.

In this example if your Force Disposition was Disruption and you were paired into an opponent’s whose Force Disposition was Take and Hold, you’d play the Death Trap mission. Your opponent’s Primary mission will differ from your own.

Conversely, if your Force Disposition is Take and Hold and your opponent’s is Disruption, then while your opponent would play the Death Trap mission, your Primary mission would be Determined Acquisition as noted in the picture above.

Each mission pairing will feature three recommended terrain layouts. Deployments will include familiar options such as Dawn of War, Tipping Point and Hammer and Anvil.

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition: Changes to Primary and Secondary Scoring

In Warhammer 40K 11th Edition your max Primary Victory Points you can earn will be 45 Victory Points, a change from the 10th Edition format which allows up to 50 Victory Points. Further, you will only be able to score a maximum of 15 Victory Points per Battle Round on Primary, which should help balance the advantage of going on the bottom of the turn on the final Battle Round.

Secondaries will remain mostly unchanged with the options to select from Fixed or Tactical Secondaries. The major change in 11th Edition is that rather than only having two Tactical Secondaries active per turn, you’ll be able to hold onto Secondary objectives to score them later, while continuing to draw two additional Secondary cards every turn. For example, if you draw Bring it Down and Overwhelming Force on Turn 1 but cannot score them, you’ll have the ability to keep them to score later and be able to continue to draw Secondaries. Note, you’ll only be able to score a maximum of 15 Victory Points off Secondaries per Battle Round though.

Twists are also returning with new changes, but it is unlikely these will be a part of competitive or tournament play.

The new Chapter Approved Mission deck will be contained in the Armageddon box set along with a new “mystery deck” which we will learn more about later.

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition Missions: What this Means for Competitive Play

The changes to these missions will have a pretty big impact on how the game is played. Specifically in that both you and your opponent will be trying to do different things in many cases. This will make the denial game a little more complex as you’ll be trying to accomplish your own Primary objectives which may put you in positions that make it difficult to deny your opponent the chance to score their own Primary objectives.

I think this will make a much more dynamic and interactive game. Rather than both players trying to take and sit on the same objectives, you’ll have the ability to score Victory Points in ways that feel meaningful for your army. Yes, objective points will still matter in most cases, but there will be other options to score Victory Points making the game much more impactful.

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition: Terrain Footprints, Layouts and Rules

Terrain Footprints in Warhammer 40K 11th Edition

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition will feature new layouts to be used in competitive 40K missions. The layouts will include the following footprints containing up to 16 pieces of terrain:

• Four large rectangles – 7″ x 11.5″
• Two large right-angle triangles – 8″ x 11.5″
• Four medium rectangles – 6″ x 4″
• Two long lines – 10″ x 2.5″
• Four short lines – 6″ x 2″

Games Workshop will have these footprints available for purchase upon release of 11th Edition and I am sure we will see 3rd party vendors popping up selling them as well. Terrain footprints will continue to protect units on the other side of it and not within it’s footprint, which they refer to as “Obscuring”, a term first seen in 9th Edition. While the footprints themselves will remain obscuring, the thin footprints allow more flexibility to use various other terrain pieces besides ruins such as pipes, barricades, trees and more.

These examples indicate suggested terrain layouts for the Crucible of Battle layout (left) and the Hammer and Anvil layout (right).

The “yellow” areas in the terrain indicate terrain features that generally won’t prohibit the movement of units like Vehicles and Monsters.

Terrain and “Stay Hidden”

Infantry, Swarm and Beast models that are within a terrain piece will be “hidden” from enemy units so long as they are more than 15″ from an enemy model (aka the model’s “Detection Range”) AND have not yet made a ranged attack. The allusion to a “Detection Range” ability seems to indicate this will be a codified rule and suggests that there will possibly be units that have a farther “Detection Range” beyond 15″. Additionally, models within terrain footprints, or otherwise receiving the benefit of cover, will impose a -1 to the Ballistic Skill of the firing model.

In the example above we see how these various units can interact with one another given their placement in and outside of terrain.

Terrain and Towering units with Plunging Fire

Plunging Fire is changing in Warhammer 40K 11th Edition as well. Plunging Fire will grant a +1 to a model’s Ballistic Skill. This will allow units to deploy or stage in positions to benefit from Plunging Fire while being able to remain hidden until they make a Ranged attack. Further, another big change is that models with the Towering keyword will benefit from Plunging Fire when making Ranged attacks against enemy units on the “ground level” that are also within 12″.

Objectives as Terrain Footprints

Objectives are no longer represented by circles, but my terrain footprints. Each mission will have 5-6 “objectives” that forces will battle over. Objective Control or OC will still be used to determine control of an objective. Units within the footprint will add their OC value and compare to the opponent’s to determine who has control of the objective.

Warhammer 40K 11th Edition: Charge and Fight Phase Changes

There are some big changes to combat coming in 40K 11th Edition. The way units and models declare Charges, Pile-in and Fight are seeing some pretty heavy revisions from 10th Edition.

Changes to How Units Charge in 11th Edition

First of all, Engagement Range is changing from being within 1” of an enemy model to being within 2”. While you won’t be able to end a move in the Movement phase within Engagement Range in 11th Edition, you will be able to move through an enemy model’s Engagement Range when moving in the Movement phase.

Now, rather than selecting an enemy unit in the Charge Phase and rolling to see if your Charge is successful, you will first declare the Charge, roll the 2 dice and any enemy unit within the distance rolled can be the target of a Charge.

The key difference here is that no longer do you merely need to get within 1” for a Charge to be successful. Rather, you will measure the distance from base to base and the target of your Charge must be within that distance.

So for example, if you have a squad of Intercessors that want to Charge a unit of Ork Boyz that are 6.5” away, and there’s no other target within 12” of the Intercessors, you will need to roll at least a 7 on your Charge roll. This is a significant change from the current edition.

Engagement Range changing to 2” also prevents the “more than 1” off the wall” trick as well. So long as a target is within your maximum charge distance they can be charged if you can end that move within 2” (i.e. Engagement Range)

Changes to the Fight Phase in 11th Edition

The Fight Phase is also going through some significant changes as well in 11th Edition.

• Before activating units to Fight, starting with the player whose turn is taking place, players will make Pile-in moves up to 3” with their units.
• When selecting units to Fight in the Fights First step, the player whose turn is taking place can select the first unit to fight. No longer will Fights First units be able to activate before a Charging unit on the active player’s turn.
• After all Fights First units have fought, the person who would be next in line to select a unit to Fight will do so regardless of whose turn is taking place.

11th Edition will also introduce a new concept called “Overrun Fight.” This rule will allow units who were eligible to Fight at the start of the Fight Phase, but do not have any units within Engagement Range when it is their turn to be selected, to make an additional Pile-in move prior to making their attacks.

This obviously creates some interesting tactical situations where units can gain extra movement in the Fights phase so selecting the order of combats and which units will fight will be strategically crucial.

Final Thoughts

It’s going to be an exciting summer this year with the release of the new edition of Warhammer 40,000. The Armageddon box set looks intriguing as well as the new rules that we’ve seen teased so far. The good news is that our codexes will continue to work until replaced with a new 11th Edition version, which is nice. I’m personally excited to see the new mission format and Detachments and how that will impact terrain layouts. It looks like GW is returning the game to its narrative roots both in casual and competitive formats, which is a good thing. The new edition looks promising so far.

See you on the tabletop.