Answers about accounts, keeping them safe, game keys and playing.
Accounts
How Do I Make an Account?
Go to Make an Account and choose a username, an email address and a password.
- Username: 3 to 20 characters, using letters, numbers and underscores.
- Password: at least 12 characters. A password that has turned up in a known breach is refused, so pick one you haven't used before.
- Email: we send an 8-digit code to prove the address is yours. Type it in within 30 minutes.
I Didn't Get My Code
- Check your spam or junk folder.
- Wait a few minutes. Outlook, Hotmail, Yahoo and AOL sometimes hold our emails back or put them in junk.
- Ask for a new code by logging in again.
- Make sure the email address is right. One wrong letter sends the code to someone else.
An account whose code is never entered is removed after 7 days, and its username and email address are free to use again.
I Forgot My Password
Go to Forgot Your Password and enter your account's email address. We email you a code, and you choose a new password with it.
I Forgot My Username
It's in every email we've sent you. Search your inbox for "New Horizons".
How Do I Change My Username?
On your account page, once every 30 days. Your old name is kept for you for 30 days. After that, anyone can take it.
How Do I Change My Email Address?
On your account page. We send a code to the new address, and the change happens when you type it in.
How Do I Change My Password?
On your account page, with your current password. Changing it logs you out everywhere else.
Security
Why Was I Emailed a Code When I Logged In?
When you log in from somewhere new we email you a code, so a stolen password isn't enough to get into your account. This check is on by default.
What Is Two-Step Login?
An extra step you can turn on from your account page. Each time you log in, you also type a code from an authenticator app on your phone.
When you turn it on you are shown 10 backup codes, once. Keep them somewhere safe: each one gets you in if you don't have your phone. If you lose both the app and the codes, we can't turn two-step login off without proof the account is yours.
How Do I Keep My Account Safe?
- Never share your password or your codes. Our staff will never ask for them.
- Use a password you use nowhere else. Other fan servers have been breached, and reused passwords are how accounts get stolen.
Where Am I Logged In?
Your account page lists the browsers logged in to your account, with the kind of browser and the day each logged in. If one isn't yours, press Log Out Everywhere Else and then change your password.
My Account Is Suspended or Banned
Log in on this site and your account page says why, and for a suspension, the day it ends. A suspension lifts by itself. You can't log in to the game until then.
Game Access and Keys
When Can I Play?
The game is coming soon. A closed alpha comes first, then a beta, and there's no date yet. The News page will say when. If you'd like to test, tick "Tell me when testing opens" on your account page: when we have keys to give, that's the list we look at first. It isn't a promise of one.
What Is a Key?
During testing you need an alpha or beta key on your account to download and play. A key can be used only as many times as it was made for. An alpha key stays good through beta.
How Do I Redeem a Key?
Log in and enter it on your account page.
Can I Give Someone a Key?
Testers may be given keys to pass on. If you have any, they are shown on your account page.
Will I Keep My Account and My Pirates?
Accounts are kept between test phases. Pirates made during alpha or beta may be wiped before the next phase, and we will say so in the news before it happens.
Deleting Your Account
Ask for it on your account page, with your password. There is a 7-day wait. If you change your mind in that time, log in and press Keep My Account. After the 7 days your record is removed and your username is free for anyone to take.
Playing
- What you need: Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit.
- Antivirus: if yours blocks the launcher, allow it. The launcher is new, and new unsigned files are often flagged.
- Updates: the launcher keeps the game up to date itself.
- Where the game goes: you choose, the first time you log in. It gets a folder of its own, "Pirates Online New Horizons", inside the one you pick. Folders Windows keeps for programs, OneDrive and network drives aren't offered, as the game can't be kept up to date there. To move it later: the launcher's Settings, "Move it".
- Removing it: Windows' Settings, Apps, "Pirates Online: New Horizons". It asks before deleting the game's folder too.
Contact
If this page doesn't answer your question, get in touch with us. Use your account's email address, and never send your password or a code.