Phasmophobia's July 21 Quality of Life Update Detailed in Preview

Developer Tom Dent has outlined what players can expect from Phasmophobia's upcoming Quality of Life update, scheduled to launch on July 21st, 2026 alongside the reworked 13 Willow Street map. The patch is the larger half of a split update — the second portion is targeted for late August.

A full breakdown of additional changes, including new keybinds and evidence-collection improvements, is promised in a separate blog the week before launch.

What changed

• Hand animations for grabbing, dropping, moving doors, and hovering over objects have been removed to speed up gameplay; the item drop animation remains visible to other players in session, just not the person dropping it.
• Earned-status cosmetics that can no longer be unlocked will be hidden from view.
• The Customisation shop camera will now zoom to the selected character part.
• On Sunny Meadows, the Ghost will only lock a wing's doors if both it and a player are inside that wing.
• Eye Adaptation now adjusts lighting more quickly when opening and closing the Journal; console players gain the ability to toggle it on or off.
• The Obake's shapeshift now counts toward the Ghost video objective.
• The Apocalypse challenge now accepts any captured media, not only a photo.
• In the Tutorial, recording Ghost Orbs is now a required step rather than an optional on-screen demonstration.

PC players will also receive number-key inventory slot switching (1–4), though full details on that and other additions are held for the pre-launch blog.

Taken together, the patch reduces moment-to-moment animation overhead while tightening several objective and challenge rules that had inconsistent edges — a meaningful baseline improvement before the second wave arrives in August.