Fallout Games in Order: Release and Story Order

There are six main Fallout games, from Fallout in 1997 to Fallout 76 in 2018, plus Fallout Tactics, the console game Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel and the mobile hit Fallout Shelter. They didn't come out in story order: Fallout 76 was the sixth main game released but is the earliest in the timeline. The Prime Video series picks up after all of them, in 2296. Both lists below match the Fallout timeline. (Fallout; Fallout 76; Fallout, "The End")

Release order#

The main series, with first release date and launch platforms:

1. Fallout, 10 October 1997, DOS and Windows. A Vault 13 dweller hunts for a water chip in Southern California and runs into the Master's super mutant army. See the Fallout story. (Fallout)
2. Fallout 2, 29 October 1998, Windows. The first hero's grandchild, the Chosen One, searches for a GECK and takes on the Enclave. See the Fallout 2 story. (Fallout 2)
3. Fallout 3, 28 October 2008, Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. The Lone Wanderer leaves Vault 101 to find their father in the ruins of Washington DC. See the Fallout 3 story. (Fallout 3)
4. Fallout: New Vegas, 19 October 2010, Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. A courier, shot and left for dead, decides who controls New Vegas and Hoover Dam. See the New Vegas story. (Fallout: New Vegas)
5. Fallout 4, 10 November 2015, Windows, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. The Sole Survivor wakes in Vault 111 and searches the Commonwealth for their stolen son. See the Fallout 4 story. (Fallout 4)
6. Fallout 76, 14 November 2018, Windows, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. An online game in which Vault 76 opens in West Virginia 25 years after the war. See the Fallout 76 story. (Fallout 76)

The spin-offs:

1. Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel, 15 March 2001, Windows. A squad-based game following a Brotherhood of Steel chapter in the Midwest. (Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel)
2. Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel, 13 January 2004, PlayStation 2 and Xbox. The first console Fallout, an action game about a Brotherhood initiate. (Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel)
3. Fallout Shelter, 14 June 2015, iOS (Android followed that August, Windows in 2016, then consoles). You run your own vault as its Overseer. (Fallout Shelter)

Story (chronological) order#

1. Fallout 76, from 2102. Reclamation Day in Appalachia, the earliest point in the games. Its later free updates move the story on a few years. (Fallout 76)
2. Fallout, December 2161 to 2162. (Fallout)
3. Fallout Tactics, around 2197. The Midwestern Brotherhood's war with the Calculator. (Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel)
4. Fallout 2, 2241 to 2242, 80 years after the first game. (Fallout 2)
5. Fallout 3, 2277, with a prologue that starts at the hero's birth in 2258. (Fallout 3)
6. Fallout: New Vegas, 2281. (Fallout: New Vegas)
7. Fallout 4, 2287, 210 years after the Great War. Its prologue is the morning of the war itself, 23 October 2077. (Fallout 4)
8. The TV series, 2296. (Fallout, "The End")

Two games don't fit neatly. Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel is set after the first game, but no later game picks up its story, and it is usually left out of the canon. Fallout Shelter has no fixed date at all: it is your vault, run your way. (Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel; Fallout Shelter)

Where the TV series fits#

The Prime Video show starts in 2296, nine years after Fallout 4 and 219 years after the Great War, so it is the latest point in the whole story. It doesn't retell any game. Lucy MacLean of Vault 33, the Brotherhood squire Maximus and the bounty hunter the Ghoul are new characters, and flashbacks show the Ghoul's life before the war as the actor Cooper Howard. (Fallout, "The End")

Season 1 (April 2024) is set in the ruins of Los Angeles and reveals what happened to Shady Sands, the capital of the New California Republic from the first two games. Season 2 (December 2025 to February 2026) goes to the Mojave and New Vegas, years after the events of New Vegas, with Mr. House and Caesar's Legion back in the story. It doesn't name an ending of the game as the true one. For a season-by-season guide, see Fallout TV series explained. (Fallout, "The End"; Fallout, "The Innovator"; Fallout, "The Strip")

Where to start#

Every main game has a new hero and a new region, so you don't need the earlier ones to follow the later ones. Each explains what you need about the Brotherhood, the vaults and the Great War as you go. (Fallout 3; Fallout: New Vegas; Fallout 4)

• New to Fallout: Fallout 4 is the most modern and the easiest to pick up. (Fallout 4)
• Want the best story: Fallout: New Vegas, especially before watching season 2 of the show. (Fallout: New Vegas)
• Want the start: Fallout and Fallout 2 set up the Brotherhood, the NCR, the Enclave and the super mutants that every later game uses. They are old isometric games, but the story holds up. (Fallout; Fallout 2)
• Want to play with friends: Fallout 76 is online and still getting updates, including one that adds the Ghoul from the show. (Fallout 76)

What's next#

In a letter on bethesda.net on 17 July 2026, Bethesda Game Studios said that Fallout 5 is in preproduction, that it has been working on remasters of Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas, and that Obsidian, the studio behind New Vegas, is working with it on a new Fallout project. No dates were given for any of them. The same letter announced Raven Rock, a major Fallout 76 expansion planned for 2027 and billed as a prequel story to Fallout 3. (Bethesda Game Studios update, July 2026)

For the full plot of every game in one place, see the Fallout story explained. (Fallout; Fallout 4)