As with all Blizzard titles, the release date is, "When it's done." They do not make estimates in advance or give hints, at least not publicly.
Diablo 3 release dates are often given/guessed at by media sources and especially by software merchants. These dates have no authority and exist solely to spur interest/pre-sales.
- News items related to Diablo 3's release date.
- Screenshot gallery of (incorrect) estimated release dates.
Contents
D3: In the Next Few Years
D3 in "Next Few Years" as of late 2009.
No one at Blizzard has ever yet given any hint of a release date, or schedule, or estimate, or anything of the kind for Diablo 3, other than to say it would not be out in 2010[1], and that as of late 2009 it was in their pipeline for the "next few years."[2]
Their only other public comments on the "when" question are terse official statements[3] that Diablo 3 does not have a release date, whenever a new rumor pops up and gains enough traction that they feel it's necessary to restate the obvious.
As of July 2010, fansite Diii.net had tagged more than twenty-five news items with the "release date rumor" keyword, showing just how often this sort of thing pops up.
Estimated Progress?
Estimates of a percentage completed are discouraged by Blizzard development teams, since there's no way to quantify the process in that fashion. They spent years working on the foundation of Diablo III: programming the game engine, trying out numerous different styles of art design, coming up with a plot and character concepts, etc. The hardware and foundational work takes as long or longer than adding in the content, which makes it impossible to estimate the overall percentage completed.
Almost since the game was announced in June 2008, the developers have said that they were well into content production.[4] (Meaning that the engine and basic game functions were all locked down and working properly.) Content though, especially in Blizzard titles, is such a huge area of work that experienced Blizzard-watchers expected the content production and balancing would take years. And with the earliest feasible release date coming in mid-2011, they'll have had at least 3 years of intensive content development by that point.
Diablo III Beta Test
Blizzard has regularly referred to their plans for a Diablo 3 Beta test. Though such a test is not yet confirmed, Blizzard has held one for every other game they've released over the past decade, and there's no reason to think Diablo III would be the exception. Such a test would likely include only the opening portion of the game, enough to get testers playing and testing out different hardware configurations for Blizzard, as well as giving feedback on the difficulty curve, game controls, instructional menus, and many other early game aspects the developers want to be sure they have perfectly designed to hook new players the first time they pick up a mouse.
Blizzard beta tests generally last 4-6 months, depending on the complexity of the game. Starcraft 2's beta began in late February 2010, and ran almost until the game was released, on July 27th. See the Diablo 3 Beta test page for more details, including how to get your spot in Diablo III's.
Blizzard Games Release Dates
One commonly-cited piece of "evidence" is the fact that no Blizzard games have (yet) been released much more than three years after they were first announced.
- Starcraft: Announced spring 1996, released April 1998. (2 years later.)
- Diablo 2: Announced Sept 1997, released June 2000. (2 years, 9 months later.)
- Warcraft 3: Announced Sept 1999, released July 2002. (2 years, 10 months later.)
- World of Warcraft: September 2001, released Nov 2004. (3 years, 1 month later.)
- Starcraft 2: Announced May 2007, released July 2010 (3 years, 2 months later.)
Diablo III was announced June 28, 2008.
Diablo = Late June
Diablo I was released in January 1997, but all of the games in the series since then have shown an affinity for late June:
- Diablo II release date: 29th of June 2000
- Diablo II: Lord of Destruction release date: 29th of June 2001
- Diablo III Announced at the WWI in Paris : 28th of June 2008
With this history in mind, many fans are hoping for a June 2011 release.
Guess the Release Date
If you're the betting type, there's a well-advanced release date prediction pool you can join in here.
Diablo III Demo
Blizzard has not said anything specifically about the upcoming demo of Diablo III, but when talking about StarCraft II, they said they had plans for a demo, and that they "use to do that after release". Most likely, we can expect a trial version of Diablo III after release.
Diablo III Expansion Packs=
Blizzard has confirmed their intention to create multiple expansion packs for Diablo III. These are expected to be released about every 18 months, following in the pattern established by World of Warcraft and Starcraft II.
Related Information
You can read more about the system requirements, beta testing, price/payment methods and age rating on the Diablo 3 Basics page.
Release Date Gallery
Images related to the Diablo III release date.
Fye's very wrong January 2010 estimate.
Swedish Gameshop: December 31, 2010.
NewEgg.com: December 31, 2010.
GameStop's in-store estimate: March 1, 2011.
Wal-Mart.com's estimate: March 1, 2011.
Fan made fake screen of a digital download page on Battle.net. June 28, 2012 date.
Archive
Past date information, now rendered obsolete by the passage of time.
Not 2010
In Activision/Blizzard financial reports, two games are reported as being released this year: Starcraft II and World of Warcraft: Cataclysm. Diablo III was never part of Blizzard's release schedule for 2010.
Starcraft II First
There were some rumors in 2008[5] that Diablo 3 was further along in the development cycle than Starcraft 2. Blizzard immediately denied that, they always said Starcraft 2 would be released first, and it was, on July 27, 2010. With Diablo 3 still nowhere near beta testing at that point, that's as thorough a rumor debunking as you're ever going to see.