World of Warcraft Launcher

World of Warcraft Launcher (referred to in press releases and the menu bar as Blizzard Launcher) is a program designed to act as a starting point for World of Warcraft players. It was included with the version 1.8.3 patch. As of the 2.1.0 patch, there is an option to hide the launcher which makes the game behave as it did before the launcher was released.

Features

The program incorporates latest Blizzard news, customer support, as well as a mechanism to play on test realms and play the game.

News and community/support updates

The News section provides information on latest topics of interest to World of Warcraft players, upcoming game content, contests and player-guide updates.

Trojan/Cheat-Program Scan

The World of Warcraft Launcher’s built-in trojan and cheat-program scanner, named Warden, is considered as an additional level of security and is particularly used to protect the customer’s interests by continuously monitoring hidden malicious (also referred as Malware) programs which collect client’s information such as account names and passwords. It does not report any information back to Blizzard, but if a bypass is made and World of Warcraft runs with a cheat program, you risk having your account closed if the cheat is detected while you are in game.

Support

The Launcher also provides quick access to World of Warcraft support website with lots of helpful information. It is the place to find detailed answers to inquiries concerning the in-game, billing or technical issues.

Public Test Button

Whenever a test version of World of Warcraft is live on the test realms, players with the test client installed are able to log in and help Blizzard test upcoming patches.

Updates

The Launcher updates itself often but irregularly. Updates to the launcher improve the Warden software and possibly add new threats to detect. Updates are often small (a few hundred kilobytes) compared to game updates.

Main Menu

See Also

Main Menu