--- title: Conan Exiles Enhanced Is Here! description: "The Unreal Engine 5 upgrade for Conan Exiles is here. Here’s what’s changing, what carries over, and what players should expect from the Enhanced version of the game! " source: "https://nodecraft.com/blog/game-news-tips/conan-exiles-enhanced-is-here" image: "https://cms-a.nodecraft.com/f/133932/1658x929/64aead21fb/conan_enhanced_update.png/m/" published: "2026-05-05T15:33:27.021Z" updated: "2026-05-05T15:33:27.021Z" --- # Conan Exiles Enhanced Is Here! The Unreal Engine 5 upgrade for Conan Exiles is here. Here’s what’s changing, what carries over, and what players should expect from the Enhanced version of the game! After eight years of surviving sandstorms, building empires, and probably losing a base or two, Conan Exiles is getting one of its biggest updates yet! On **May 5, 2026**, Conan Exiles Enhanced launches as a free upgrade on Steam, bringing the game over to Unreal Engine 5. This is not just a small visual update. It is a pretty major upgrade to how the game looks, runs, and feels overall. If you have been waiting for a reason to jump back in or finally try it out, this is probably it! --- ## A Completely Rebuilt Experience At its core, Conan Exiles Enhanced takes everything that already exists and updates it to a much more modern standard. Visually, the improvements are noticeable right away. Lighting, shadows, and terrain detail all feel more natural, which helps the world feel less flat and a bit more immersive. Performance has also been a focus. The game is targeting smoother frame rates across a range of settings, even on larger servers or more complex builds. As always, your results will depend on your setup, but the goal is a more consistent experience overall. One unexpected improvement is the install size. The client has been reduced to around 68GB, which is a big drop from where it used to sit. There is also proper Steam Deck support now, which opens things up quite a bit for players who prefer handheld play. --- ## One Unified World One of the more meaningful changes is how the game now handles maps. Previously, you had to choose between the Exiled Lands and the Isle of Siptah. Now, both exist as part of the same experience. You can travel between them without restarting, servers can support both at the same time, and you can stick with a single character across everything. It makes multiplayer feel more connected and a lot less segmented. There is one tradeoff to be aware of. Bases built on the Isle of Siptah **will not** carry over due to how the map was reworked for this system. Characters, inventory, and followers still transfer, but structures will need to be rebuilt. --- ## Quality of Life Changes Beyond the engine upgrade, there are a few changes that make every day gameplay feel smoother. You can now have multiple characters on a single account, which removes the need to constantly restart or overwrite progress just to try something new. The interface has also been cleaned up. Menus are easier to move through and feel a bit more modern without changing too much of the core layout. Crafting is less tedious as well. Stations can now pull materials from nearby storage and follower inventories, which cuts down on a lot of unnecessary back and forth. Modding support is still there at launch, though some mods will need time to update. A refreshed dev kit is available, and several popular mods are expected to be ready early! Individually, these are small changes. Together, they remove a lot of the little annoyances that have plagued some players throughout the years. --- ## What Happens to the Old Version? The previous version of the game is now referred to as Conan Exiles Legacy. It is still available, but it is no longer the main version going forward. On PC, official servers move to the Enhanced version, and Legacy will not receive new content updates. Features like the Bazaar are also disabled there, and certain currencies will no longer be usable. At this point, it mainly exists for private servers, single player, or anyone who needs to stay on the older version. --- ## Save Transfers and Server Changes For most players, this update does not mean starting over. Characters, inventory, and followers carry over. Bases built in the Exiled Lands transfer as well. The main exception is the Isle of Siptah, where structures do not carry over due to the map merge. If you are running a private server, the process is still fairly straightforward, but it is worth preparing ahead of time. **Backing up your files before updating is strongly recommended.** The first startup after upgrading may take longer while everything converts, and you may notice slightly higher resource usage under Unreal Engine 5. --- ## Final Thoughts It would be easy to look at Conan Exiles Enhanced as just a visual upgrade, but it does more than that behind the scenes. Moving to Unreal Engine 5 gives the game more room to grow, improves performance over time, and makes more advanced modding possible. If you already own Conan Exiles on Steam, there is not much reason not to try it. The upgrade is free, your progress carries over, and the overall experience feels smoother without changing what made the game enjoyable in the first place. If you have been on the fence, this is probably the best version of the game to start with. It does not reinvent everything, but it removes a lot of the friction that built up over time and sets the game up for what comes next. We think that this update is *exactly* what Conan needed and we can't wait to get into it.