World of Warcraft: Shadowlands could not be pre-ordered without prior purchase Battle for Azeroth, but with the pre-expansion patch, you can now play the expansion for free(ish). If you decide to pause Blizzard's most recent expansion, I have good news: you won't need to buy it if you want to get into Shadowlands whenever it launches later this year.
Battle for Azeroth has been integrated into the base subscription of World of Warcraft.
As of Update 9.0.1 (the Shadowlands pre-expansion patch), Battle for Azeroth has been merged into the base game, and an active subscription is all you'll need to access the expansion (in assuming you bought the base game of course). Anyone who bought it just before this update will probably be a little salty, but the move makes sense. Legion was added to the base game the same way when Battle for Azeroth released, and since BfA is the intended leveling expansion for levels 10-50 for all new players, it would have been odd for the expansion to stay locked behind a purchase. .
That said, you'll still have to pay for Shadowlands if you plan to play it. I mean, you could technically wait for the next pre-expansion patch for what's next, but it's probably a few years away. Maybe wait for community reviews and impressions to land, then jump in? Jokes aside, you no longer need Battle for Azeroth to pre-order Shadowlands. So if you're like me and have dropped out of the expansion, feel free to jump in and check out some of the new changes coming to World of Warcraft. The improved leveling experience tempted me to level some others for a change (I've never been an 'alt-oholic'), and given that we don't yet know the new Shadowlands release date , we should have plenty of time to readjust.
