Hearthstone Is Finally Getting the Monk Class

Photo: Kat Lee / The Nerd Wire

Blizzard confirmed at BlizzCon 2026 that Hearthstone is adding the Monk class in March 2027 — what Blizzard calls its first new class in six years.

The Nerd Wire was on the ground in Anaheim, and for a game that adds new heroes far more rarely than new card sets, this is a milestone rather than a routine drop.

The first new class since 2020

Hearthstone launched with nine classes and has only expanded that lineup once, adding the Demon Hunter back in 2020. A new class changes the game at a structural level — new hero power, new class-specific cards, new deck archetypes, and a fresh axis for the meta to reorganize around. That’s why “first new class in six years” is the real headline here: this is the biggest kind of addition Hearthstone makes.

The Monk brings World of Warcraft’s martial-artist fantasy to the card game, with Chen Stormstout at the door. Blizzard describes the class as agile and adaptable with a fluid playstyle, and the roadmap slots it into the first expansion of 2027 alongside a Core Set refresh and Standard rotation. How players unlock Monk — free or paid, and with which set — hasn’t been announced; the team told Inven Global it isn’t ready to share those details. The hero power and card identity weren’t detailed at the ceremony either, and we’ll update as Blizzard shares the kit. One bit of context: Monk was the community’s top pick in a BlizzCon 2023 survey.

What else Hearthstone announced

The Monk headlines a busy Hearthstone slate:

• Reign of the Black Empire, the next expansion, arrives October 20 (10:00 a.m. PT), with a pre-release Tavern Brawl October 13–20. It goes back to Azeroth’s earliest age, when C’Thun, N’Zoth, Yogg-Saron and Y’Shaarj ruled a corrupted world. The four Old Gods are Legendary Neutral minions — one per deck — each with four once-per-game abilities; instead of attacking, a god invokes two of them per turn, and once all four are spent it’s free to attack. The set’s keyword is Assemble: add a minion to your hand, then replace part of its text with text from another minion in a curated pool. Blizzard hasn’t announced the card count.
• Battlegrounds gets a new minion type, Aberrations, in Patch 36.6.1 on September 22. They’re built around discarding: each friendly Aberration that dies advances your Deity’s progress, and after three sacrifices either C’Thun or Y’Shaarj (one per game, chosen at random) joins the fight. Naga rotate out.
• Black Market, a new event type with haggling, runs September 15 – October 13. Patch 36.6 lands September 15 with a free M.O.T.H.E.R. card.
• The in-game Journal and main menu are being rebuilt so quests, achievements, stories and events live in one place, instead of siloing each set’s narrative.
• Further out on the roadmap: a 2v2 Tavern Brawl, a Winter Veil event, more new Brawls, a Pandaren minion type and a new Boss Fight event type. As always, Blizzard notes content and timing are subject to change.

But March is the date to circle. A new Hearthstone class doesn’t come around often — the last one took six years. The rest of the show, from Diablo V to Heroes of the Storm’s first new hero since 2020, is in our BlizzCon 2026 hub.

More from BlizzCon 2026

• Everything Announced at BlizzCon 2026 — the full hub, every franchise, every date
• Heroes of the Storm Is Getting a New Hero: Xal’atath
• Overwatch Reveals Doctrine, a Vampire-Inspired Support Hero
• World of Warcraft: Forever Is Blizzard’s New Third Version of WoW
• BlizzCon 2026 Guide: Dates, Tickets, Livestream and Every Digital Reward

Sources: Blizzard Entertainment’s Reign of the Black Empire announcement and Opening Ceremony recap; Inven Global; on-site reporting by The Nerd Wire.