When is the World of Warcraft Cataclysm Classic closed beta start date? — It’s live now!

Cataclysm Classic is arriving at the start of Summer and the 2024 Classic roadmap clearly indicates there will be a closed beta beforehand. Originally intended to occur before the arrival of Self-Found Mode, a February update to the roadmap delayed the beta until afterwards. With Self-Found Mode now available, the next major event for World of Warcraft Classic would be the arrival of the beta any day now — and it’s here! Surprise! Cataclysm Classic closed beta is now live!

The beta itself is not expected to differ highly from previous expansions’ testing. With the pre-patch events scheduled to arrive earlier than the expansion itself, it’s likely that the initial testing will be for those features. The development team is providing update notes that detail what is unavailable for testing and what the known issues are. Right now the focus is on the leveling process to 80, as Cataclysm revamped most of the zones in the Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor. Currently leveling past 80 (and the associated zones) are not available, nor are the Goblin and Worgen starting experiences. The arguably most important feature of all time — Transmogrification — is also not available for testing yet, nor is Reforging or Archaeology. As those are system changes that should go into effect with the prepatch event, we would expect them — alongside Gilneas and Kezan — to become available for testing shortly.

In order to participate in the Cata Classic beta you’ll need to opt-in on the Classic website — instructions on how to do so are here. Previous betas for the Classic expansions never went into “open” mode nor provided keys for access if I recall correctly, so you will need to opt-in in order to participate. As far as we currently know this is the only way to get beta access, so as always be sure to be careful about beta key scams.