EA has announced it will shut down BioWare’s Anthem on January 12, 2026.
Because Anthem’s only content is online, this means the game will be unplayable after that date.
Premium in-game currency will stop being sold today, though existing balances will still be able to be used until the game shuts down. The game will be removed from EA Play on August 15, 2025, but will still be available for download if it’s already in your library until it officially shuts down.
Anthem launched in February of 2019 to lukewarm reviews, including our own 6.5/10 which criticized the grindiness, lack of polish and variety, and a mismatched story. The game had sold 5 million copies as of December of 2023, which fell short of EA’s target of 6 million copies in the first few months. Though EA continued to update and improve Anthem in the months that followed its launch, in February of 2021, EA ceased active development on the game. The following month, its game director departed the company.
In an FAQ, EA stated that no layoffs occurred at the company as the result of Anthem’s sunset. This will come as a relief, given that EA has undergone a number of massive staffing cuts in the last few years that have left staff reeling.
In May, EA shut down Cliffhanger Games and canceled its in-development Black Panther game, laying off an unknown number of individuals in the process. That same month, it implemented mandatory return-to-office for all workers.
Just the month before, EA laid off roughly 300 people, and still earlier this year EA restructured Anthem developer BioWare, moving some developers to other projects and laying off others. That was all just in 2025. Last year, EA underwent a massive restructuring that resulted in 670 workers laid off company-wide, and the year before that in 2023, 50 individuals were laid off at BioWare and an unknown number of others were cut at Codemasters.
As for BioWare, it’s currently fully focused on Mass Effect 5 after the sales failure of Dragon Age: The Veilguard.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can find her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to [email protected].
