EVE Online is rebuilding its HUD, and you get to opt out for a long time
EVE Online is taking apart its most established interface, and its second HUD devblog is unusually explicit about the order: an opt-in phase, then a long opt-out phase, then a full transition only once most people have moved. A first version is aimed at the next expansion, with no date attached.
The studio is Fenris Creations, renamed from CCP when it returned to independent ownership on 6 May 2026.
What changes, and in which release
| Element | Change | Stage |
|---|---|---|
| Speed | Moves out of the medallion into its own controls | First |
| Health | Shield, armour and hull stay around the capacitor, with clearer proportions and possible ticks | First |
| Capacitor | Keeps its circle, gains a gauge showing how fast energy is gained or lost | First |
| Rack heat | Moves beside the medallion, oriented at the rack it belongs to | First |
| Overload | Becomes its own interaction; Shift-click is preserved | First |
| Modules | Clearer active and inactive states, a moving cycle indicator, discoverable shortcuts | First |
| Minimap | On-grid, metro and system views | Second |
| Boosters | Dedicated consumable slots with shortcuts | Third |
| Customisation | HUD as movable components, hideable parts | Fourth |
Our take: what it means for players
The rollout plan is better than the redesign, and the redesign looks good.
An opt-in phase, then an opt-out phase the studio itself expects to run long, then a transition only at high adoption, is how you change a twenty-year-old interface without taking a decade of learned reflexes from the people who built it. Compare that with the industry norm of shipping a new UI on patch day and learning from the forums afterwards. Nobody's Friday fleet gets ruined by a redesign they did not ask for, and the studio still gets its modernisation.
The research is credited where it belongs, and it should be noted: new players brought in to be watched, veterans interviewed, sessions with the player council the blog calls the CSM, plus a workshop and a booth at Fanfest. The single most useful finding in the whole blog came from watching newcomers fail to realise the security status element was a button at all. That is not something a designer finds by thinking harder.
Our one reservation is sequencing. Customisation, the thing veterans have asked for longest and the answer to the extra screen space a minimap and booster slots will eat, is explicitly last. Screen real estate is a real cost for a game played in three windows, and shipping the parts that take space before the parts that let you hide them is the wrong order for the people most likely to opt in early.
What's next
A third blog is promised, covering what comes after this work. The first HUD iteration is targeted at the next expansion with no announced date, so nothing here joins the calendar yet.
Common questions
Is EVE Online's new HUD mandatory?
Not for a long time. The blog describes an opt-in phase first, then an opt-out phase the studio expects to be quite long, and only a full transition once adoption is high. It compares the process to the Photon UI rollout.
What is changing in the EVE HUD medallion?
Speed controls move out of the medallion into their own part of the HUD. Shield, armour and hull stay around the capacitor with clearer proportions and possible tick marks, the capacitor gains a gauge showing gain or loss rate, and rack heat indicators move to the sides pointing at the racks they belong to.
When will the new EVE HUD arrive?
The studio is aiming to have a first version ready around the next expansion, with no date given. The first iteration covers the medallion, overload and modules; the minimap follows, then boosters, then customisation.
Written by 0hp from the publisher's own announcement, linked above, and every specific in it was checked against that page by a second pass before it published. Independent, and not affiliated with the publisher. Dates are announced or labelled as estimates. How this site is written, and how to correct it.
