Five New Fortnite Sprites Arrive This Week as Player Numbers Keep Climbing

Fortnite's Sprite craze is showing no signs of slowing down — five new species are joining the roster in this week's update, currently scheduled to drop on Thursday, June 25.

The five new Sprites and their perks: Striker Sprite triggers Overdrive when you Mantle or Hurdle and unlocks by scoring a goal at the new Football Pitch POI; Fishy Sprite boosts swim speed and gives a brief movement speed bump when you take damage; Aura Sprite generates a Shock Rock charge after dealing enough damage; Boss Sprite raises your max Health and Shield and drops from any Boss; and Grim Reaper Sprite marks anyone who attacks you for a duration. Epic has confirmed more Sprites will roll out weekly for the rest of the season, including several fan-designed species.

The timing matters — Fortnite hit over 1.2 million concurrent players in core battle royale modes last Saturday during a pair of two-hour Power Hour events that significantly boosted rare Sprite spawn rates. Outside of this month's major live story event, that's the game's biggest battle royale headcount since March, and day-to-day numbers are noticeably up compared to the tail end of last season. The Sprite system — built around finding gameplay-affecting creatures, levelling them up, and extracting them to carry into future matches — has clearly landed.

The popularity has spilled outside the game entirely: players have been listing rare Sprite variants on eBay, and Epic told IGN it's cracking down on those sales as a violation of Fortnite's rules. Ultra-rare shiny variants exist for each species, including the Galaxy Zero Point Sprite with a reported 0.0000014% drop rate, though Epic's built-in trading and sharing system means even those are circulating among players.