Cyberpunk 2077 co-op mod NightCoop: open beta for up to 8 players starts Oct. 23 at 11 a.m. ET

Cyberpunk 2077 gets the co-op CD Projekt Red never shipped, through a fan mod that opens to everyone on Oct. 23. Here’s when the NightCoop beta starts, how co-op works and what you need to join.

When does the NightCoop open beta start?

The open beta starts on Friday, Oct. 23, 2026, at 11 a.m. ET, 8 a.m. PT and 15:00 UTC. The NightCoop team announced the date in its beta trailer on Oct. 18, and the 109-second video passed 465,000 views on YouTube by Oct. 22. A gameplay video from Oct. 15, with host and partner shown side by side on two PCs, passed 192,000 views.

Before the beta, NightCoop ran closed tests on the campaign’s prologue and first act. The official site shows a countdown to the start and marks downloads as not yet available.

How NightCoop co-op works. NightCoop puts up to 8 players in one shared world, and the rules are simple:

• The world belongs to the hostQuest progress, NPCs and the state of Night City come from the host’s save, and guests join it.
• Each player keeps their own VEvery guest arrives with their own look, level, gear and cyberware, and shops at vendors and ripperdocs separately.
• Dialogue goes to a voteA choice passes when more than half of the players back it. NightCoop’s gameplay video sums it up: “the majority wins for everyone.” Cutscenes play for all players at the same moment, and only V’s voice differs.
• Combat is sharedEveryone sees the same enemies, shots, grenades and deaths, and damage from any player counts.
• Cars are shared tooPlayers ride in one car as driver and passengers or split across several, and story rides happen together.
• Harder enemies are optionalA host setting gives enemies new skills, such as grenades, blocking and smarter tactics, instead of more health.

The trailers also show braindances, the Heist mission, a partner’s Sandevistan and stealth takedowns played together.

PvP with one switch. The host turns PvP on or off in the game’s Co-op menu, even in the middle of a session. With PvP off, players can’t hurt each other.

With PvP on, damage follows the full combat model: the attacker’s weapon, mods, perks, headshots and critical hits against the target’s armor, resistances, blocking and dodging. NightCoop balances damage between players of different levels, so a single hit can’t take down a player at full health. A beaten player goes down and either gets revived or stands back up, and a downed player can’t be finished off. Duels don’t roll back the world and give no experience, rewards or wanted level.

Joining takes three steps: everyone installs RED4ext and NightCoop, the host opens a session from the game’s Co-op menu with an existing save or a new game, and guests connect directly or through NightCoop’s hub server, which also works behind a provider’s NAT. The connection runs over UDP and survives Wi-Fi drops, according to the site. A guest’s own campaign stays untouched, since progress in the shared world belongs to the host’s save.

Cyberpunk 2077 update 2.5, the free Edgerunners 2 Update, came out on Oct. 22, one day before the beta, with dual-wielding, cyberware skins and two new side quests, as our update 2.5 patch notes page explains. NightCoop lists patch 2.31 as its supported version and hasn’t said whether the beta build runs on 2.5.

NightCoop is free and stays free, according to its developers: every build goes out to everyone at once, and Patreon donations are voluntary and unlock nothing. The game itself cost $17.99 on Steam on Oct. 22, 70% off its $59.99 price.

NightCoop is an unofficial fan mod, and its site and videos say it isn’t affiliated with or endorsed by CD Projekt Red. For official content, Phantom Liberty stays the game’s only paid expansion, as our Cyberpunk 2077 DLC page explains, and the sequel sits in preproduction, as our Cyberpunk 2 page tracks.

This page is updated as soon as the NightCoop beta goes live or NightCoop confirms support for update 2.5.