Fortnite’s ‘Waiting In Queue’ Explained: Can It Be Fixed?

Fans have been met with a ‘Waiting in Queue’ message when booting up the latest Season of Fortnite, but is there a way to fix it?

After more than six years on the market, Fortnite has taken fans back to the beginning with Chapter 4 Season 5, bringing back a classic map from early in the hit battle royale’s life.

Because of this digital trip down memory lane, lapsed fans and devoted diehards have flooded developer Epic Games’ servers, so much so that the game hit a new peak player count for one day, reaching over 44 million gamers in a single day (via Epic).

Because of this, high wait times could be a possibility for those trying to get in on the action, as is the way with most major online game launches.

Fortnite’s Waiting In Queue’ Meaning Explained

Thanks to increased server loads because of the recent Fortnite OG launch, gamers trying to boot up the title have been consistently greeted by queue messages on the title’s initial loading screen.

This “Waiting in Queue” message usually comes with an estimated waiting time which can vary from a few seconds to upwards of an hour.

These queue messages can be the result of several factors, the most common of which is the sheer amount of players all trying to access the game at once.

Seeing as Fortnite Season 4 Chapter 5 has brought back so many former players as well as activated the engrained community to continue to play, the Epic Games servers can reach capacity, resulting in a queue bottling up players until there is room to allow more in.

Other causes of the “Waiting in Queue” loading message can be trying to boot the game during scheduled maintenance (which can take place before a major update) or a low internet connection causing a timeout after multiple attempts to ping the Epic Games servers.

Can You Fix the Fortnite Waiting In Queue Problem?

Sadly, there are no surefire fixes to work around the Fortnite waiting times, but there are a few strategies to employ that may alleviate some of the pain or make the wait a little bit shorter.

The best way to avoid these long wait times is to play the game outside of peak hours. Typically, most people play Fortnite on weekday afternoons and weekend mornings. Working around that is best to get into the action as soon as possible.

Also, when playing, avoid quitting or closing the Fortnite client. This ensures gamers will keep their place on the Fortnite servers and another wait will not be needed if they try to log back on.

Just be wary of staying logged in, as inactivity on a console or PC can eventually shut the device down or put it into sleep mode. These sorts of power-saving safety measures can be changed in the device’s settings.

When it comes to avoiding a queue because of scheduled maintenance, the best thing one can do is keep the Fortnite client as up-to-date as possible. Installing updates as they release will ensure there is no sitting around for a download to complete before hitting start.

If everything is up to date and it is outside of peak hours, another spot to check is @FortniteStatus on X (formerly Twitter). This account constantly checks the status of Fortnite‘s online services and easily explains why the game might be down for any given reason.

And if all that fails, make sure to restart the console/PC and router and try again.

Fortnite Chapter 4 Season 5 continues on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, PC, and mobile until Saturday, December 2 at 10 p.m.