Zwift has released a major game update allowing Zwifters to choose between two worlds when they begin a session. No longer restricted to the scheduled world of the day, Zwifters can opt to ride in the less-populated “Guest Map” if they choose.
Home World, Guest World
The new functionality is straightforward enough. First: Watopia will always be available as the “home world.”
Second: the other four worlds (London, New York, Innsbruck and Richmond) will take turns rotating into the “Guest World” spot. The guest world schedule will be released monthly, much as the monthly schedule has been released up to this point.
The “Join Another Zwifter?” rider list changes depending on the world you choose, allowing you to see which world riders are in.
Why Not All Worlds?
Since its inception, Zwift has focused on the social side of cycling (and now running). They chose not to open up all worlds concurrently because they want to protect that social experience–they don’t want anyone riding alone in a sparsely-populated world.
People I’ve spoken with at Zwift HQ have been quick to point out that, in some sense, Zwifters do have access to all worlds at all times, since event organizers can hold events in any world. Zwift is happy with organizers holding rides on “off-calendar” worlds, of course, because those group events maintain the social aspect of Zwifting no matter which world they are held on.
World Hack: “Third World” Access?
Does the tried and true world hack still work in this new Guest World system? Yes! Whatever world you hack into will replace Watopia on the World Choice menu.
What Happened to the Airport?
When Jon Mayfield posted about Zwift’s plans for world choice back in November he shared a mockup of an airport which would act as the transportation hub between worlds. With no airport in tonight’s release I can only assume Zwift decided to scrap this idea in order to get Guest World functionality launched. And I think that’s a smart move!
See you out on course!
Have enough trouble with the app showing the maps of the worlds when the event is a world swap. Seems to be a fairly regular occurrence.
someone check hell.. has the temp dropped?
I’ll just leave my tweet reply here rather than ranting any further:
@zwiftinsider 1995 called, they want their text based adventure game back… How about zwift do the sensible thing and put all the world’s into one big cycling continent and call it say, oooh o don’t know.. Watopia. No more stupid world switching. It’d be like a real mmo! #zwift
Obviously that’s Zwift’s call, not mine. But I like having different worlds, each with its own “feel.” And there are MMO’s that work this way.
Totally agree
Hope in the feature we ll be able to organize events (race o group workouts) even if we are not part of big teams(mine is only 80 people strong). Meet ups are first step in this direction… I think maps like NYC or INN are good only for races or to perform a group workout without thousend of zwifters near you.
I for one could care less about world switching for the most part. I like being “forced” to ride the course available that day. It keeps it interesting. The new format is a nice compromise. The functionality is clean too. Zwift has come a long way in three short years. I’ve enjoyed it and also gotten a lot out of it. Focus on the good in something and that’s what you get. Focus on the bad and well, you get that too. Ride on.
Amen!!!!!
About time! I’m all for the daily rotating guest world, although being able to choose ANY world from the guest list is the next step as more and more people are online at once. It’s great to be able to see how many Zwifters are riding each world too. Most of the time I want to log in and just ride Watopia anyway so this latest update is a big step forwards!
Well done Zwift team on this update (but long, long, long, long overdue).
Any info yet on the February guest world schedule. I’m hopeful that Richmond and insbruck will have a decent number of days so that I can actually get to ride them outside of events.
Is it Available on Apple TV? I just logged in and it was still the old menu with no world option?
Not yet. Should be within the next few days.
Great to have this feature! I’m one of the “not arsed to use worldhack” guys, so I was happily pedaling away on any given world, however, Watopia is my first choice, so I’m good with that implementation. One thing what buggers me, is the Meetup functionality. We’ve started to use it regularly, and it would be great if the organizer could pick any route from Watopia and the guest world, not only according to the actual calendar. I do hope this functionality will arrive soon 🙂
Anyhow, nice update, thanks for that 🙂
It sounds like once Companion gets its update (next week?) you’ll be able to schedule Meetups on the guest world or Watopia.
I think we’ll see a lot of Meetups on the guest world, since people want to ride with just their friends and the guest worlds are a lot less crowded. Unless they also introduce hiding other riders when they update meetups, which I also think would be good.
When is the IOS update out?
Next few days.
I’m one of the few that doesn’t seem to really care which world it’s on, because the alternative of going back to the drainer pre-Zwift (or any other program) is not something I would ever want again. I am glad to see this however in that it means it will thin out the crowds…I hope. I’ve had to go the route of turning wifi off in ride just to make it bearable. I could care less about the social aspects of Zwift. I do get why people would be upset about not having all world access or the one comment of just combining them all into one map. We are paying for it, give us the full access. I rather like the idea of everything all in one map.
Interesting to know all the ways that you can choose where to ride! Zwift clearly is focused on the social aspect of riding as seen with the group rides, events, participation prizes (unlock kits), chats, and ride ons (very similar to likes). You could make a million customizable worlds (even personally created) but without other riders it will eventually lead to hum-drums. There may be a few or even several creative people out there that could create amazing worlds; however it takes dedication and time to make a realistic world with details that works. Reminds me of Minecraft or other previous world generators. It may be fun to create, but then you loose site of why you signed up for Zwift! Ride, ride, ride-on…and do it with friends!
Had the same question, Mark – as soon as Apple approve it I think, normally a few days when the update is significant and not just minor bug fixes. Very much looking forward to seeing it!
Should be in the next couple of days according to Zwift. Same for other IOS and Android devices.
That was in reply to those asking about ATV and other devices being updated but it didn’t get inserted under the original comment!
Nice update
Remember cycling is a sport for antisocial
NYC…*tumble weed blows by*…
Good news, thanks 🙂
I am really glad they did not do full world choice, it will give everyone something to complain about still. 🙂 But seriously I am interested to see the number of riders actively choosing the guest world over watopia, numbers looked pretty low this morning in those choosing London. Maybe if guest world one ever suffers from overcrowding we will get guest world 2 or the optional short course to go along with the guest world.
I think this world choice is a nice little feature. But I can hardly call it a ‘major’ update. Just as last update almost two months ago (beyond level 25) was not worth to be called ‘major’ update. Seems like Zwift development is slowing? Or is something BIG coming soon??
Will be interesting to see how many will choose each guest world over Watopia – at the moment, there are more than 5000 in Watopia and less than 500 in London.
Personally I prefer Watopia – but if these numbers continue, I will probably choose the guest world a lot of the time just because I like the less crowded roads more…
Eric, will I have to update anything manually on Apple TV, or will it just be updated for me on Zwift? I’m a first-time owner of Apple TV and don’t know how they update the apps.
Does this update make my butt look fat?
With ATV you will need to go to the App store and update Zwift when the update is available.
Mark, I already have auto-updates set to On in Apple TV, so I don’t take any action, right?
Yep, I will never ride NYC again 😉
Daniel, I’ve used ATV about a year & have auto updates on, never had to manually take action to update
Yes it sounds like you will be ok
Eric, what about the ” just watch” mode, now we have ” Guest world”. I wanted to watch a friend riding TdZ stage 8 in London. But if I enter Zwift and choose for just watch I don’t have a choose. It opens standard in Watopia. Do I oversee something, or is the ” Just watch” function only possible on Watopia now?
I currently run Zwift through my iPhone. What do I need to do to get the Guest World upgrade?
ATV update is Live 🙂
I’m glad they didn’t do the airport. Just looking at the drawing, yuck, it’s a messy interface. This one is very slick. A simple interface, using tab, and users can just toggle which world they want. Love the cleanness of the interface. It serves its purpose without trying so hard.
I’m really not that bothered about where I’m riding .I’m just looking at my watts more than the scenery.
Wherever they put me is good for me .
Eric, I had to do a reinstall of zwift when one of the updates froze. I no longer have a prefs.xml file. I have a prefs but it is not the same as the old prefs.xml file that I used to do my world hacks on. Is there anyway to get another prefs.xml file? I have reloaded zwift twice without getting that file. Or is there another way to do world hacks?
I think it’s unfortunate that the world hack now replaces the home world (Watopia) and not the rotating guest. I think everyone, including me, likes Watopia and so that should stay fixed without question, but I would think it would have been better to allow the hack to replace the guest world so people who basically like to pick between London and Watopia could just stick with those two and tell the other three, especially Richmond, to shove off.
In the end not bringing the ‘airport’ concept to fruition seems to be a let down. This erratic start / stop functionality of the Zwift app has been something that people (paid subscribers) have been complaining about for a long time, well that and crappy update functions and forced updates that can render you 1/2 hour behind your schedule (which should have been user deferred).
Until these things, especially how the app starts and stops, are addressed I really question how Zwift will move forward? I suspect that making the program function like a real program is something they don’t look forward to doing because it will probably require a major overhaul. But if it’s not done now then when?
I guess we can hope, but I wouldn’t bet on it.