It’s Official: Rec Room is Shutting Down

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The creators of Rec Room have announced the game will be closing later this year. After ten years, the popular game is unfortunately coming to an end.

Rec Room is often likened to Roblox, offering players a social space where they can build and explore user-created rooms. While virtual reality (VR) games aren’t mainstream, Rec Room attracted a large audience—over 150 million players—thanks to both VR headset users and those who played on platforms like the Nintendo Switch. Despite this success, the game is now facing challenges.

Rec Room Announces Permanent Shutdown

On March 30, 2026, Rec Room announced it would be shutting down on June 1st. While the game was popular, reaching over 150 million players with millions still playing monthly, the creators couldn’t find a way to make it profitable. The cost of running and maintaining the game had become higher than the revenue it generated. Changes in the virtual reality market and the broader gaming landscape also contributed to the decision.

Players who currently have a Rec Room account can keep playing until the game shuts down, but new players won’t be able to join. Account creation and adding friends are now disabled, and the Rec Room+ subscription is no longer available to new users. Current Rec Room+ members will have their subscriptions extended until the shutdown date. Creators who partner with Rec Room can still redeem their tokens, and those who earned Room Rewards in March will receive them next month. As a thank you to the community, all official Rec Room content is now 80% off, and some features previously only for Rec Room+ subscribers are now available to everyone.

Although many players and creators are disappointed that Rec Room is closing, the game is offering ways to remember and preserve the experiences within it. Players can save their photos and receive a personalized “report card” as a keepsake. Those on the Steam version will also be able to download their created rooms in about a week. This data can then be used to recreate those rooms in other platforms, such as the Unity game engine. It’s important to download this data before the game closes, as it will no longer be available afterward.

While popular on many platforms, the game Rec Room never launched for PlayStation VR2, even though it was available on the original PS VR. The developers said in 2024 that creating a version for the new headset would have been too expensive. This might have been a good thing, considering the PS VR2 didn’t sell well and Sony reduced its production. Even if the PS VR2 had been successful, the developers believed that financial challenges with Rec Room might have led to the game shutting down even faster if they’d invested in another VR port.

Rec Room once seemed poised for great success, attracting significant investment that valued the company at $3.5 billion between 2016 and 2021. However, funding stopped after that, and the company began layoffs in 2025, cutting its workforce in both March and August – with the August cuts eliminating half of all employees. Fans of the game may want to visit and play soon, as it’s likely to shut down in 2026.

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2026-04-01 02:04