By Jacob Miller | Jul 10, 2026
The legal backdrop is worth recalling. Unknown Worlds had been locked in a dispute with publisher Krafton over an unpaid $250 million bonus, with the conflict casting a shadow over the game's development and the studio's internal morale. A settlement was eventually reached, with Krafton agreeing to distribute bonuses to all Unknown Worlds employees, including those who joined after the studio was acquired in 2021. Around the same time, CEO Ted Gill stepped down, with both parties describing the leadership change as a mutual decision aimed at setting the company on the best possible path forward. The arrival of this first update, paired with a milestone sales figure, suggests the studio has come through that turbulence with genuine momentum behind it.
What the July Update Actually Adds
The update's biggest headline additions are two brand-new Biolabs, Coral Gardens and Axum Ruins, which expand the game's underwater world with fresh locations to explore. On the progression side, the maximum number of Biomods available to players has been increased from four to six, giving more room for customisation and build variety. Players can now also unlock additional passive Biomod slots by scanning creatures using the Bioscanner, adding a new layer of incentive to exploration. It is the kind of change that rewards curiosity, which has always been central to what makes the Subnautica series appealing.
Co-op play has also received meaningful attention in this update. Audio logs no longer trigger automatically when a player picks them up, removing the frustrating situation where one person's discovery interrupts an entire group session. Logs can now be accessed manually through the PDA Databank instead, keeping each player's experience more personal and less disruptive to others. Beyond that, the update includes more routes and oxygen-based puzzles in wrecks, the ability to sprint on land outside the water, improved building placement for various structures, a new dedicated storage building, and further improvements to creature behaviour, rendering, and the user interface. It is a well-rounded package that touches multiple aspects of the experience rather than focusing narrowly on one area.
The Bigger Picture for Subnautica 2
Executive Producer Fernando Melo framed the update as a deliberate effort to strengthen the game's foundations before continuing to grow its content. The priority was improving the early hours of the experience and making core systems feel more polished and intuitive before pushing further outward. Melo confirmed that Unknown Worlds intends to continue building the game in close dialogue with its community throughout the Early Access period, with player feedback feeding directly into future updates rather than being treated as an afterthought.
Hitting 5 million copies sold within the first month of Early Access is a significant achievement by any standard, and puts Subnautica 2 firmly in the conversation as one of the biggest survival games of 2026. If the studio can maintain this pace of meaningful, community-responsive updates while continuing to expand the game's world and systems, the full release has the potential to be something genuinely special. The legal drama may have defined the lead-up to launch, but right now the game itself is doing the talking.
