What was the maximum raid size in the original World of Warcraft?

The maximum raid size in the original World of Warcraft was 40 players. When the game launched in 2004, raid groups were designed for large-scale encounters that could bring together up to forty characters against powerful bosses.

This format shaped early WoW raiding. Content such as Molten Core, Onyxia's Lair, Blackwing Lair, Ahn'Qiraj, and Naxxramas required extensive coordination among multiple groups, with players assigned to tanks, healers, damage dealers, and specialist roles. Organizing forty people was itself a major part of the challenge.

The number is often confused with later raid formats. World of Warcraft eventually introduced smaller 10-player and 25-player versions of many raids, while some modern raids use flexible group sizes or support up to 30 players in the Mythic difficulty. Those later formats do not change the original game's 40-player limit.

A related historical detail is that early raids often used fixed group sizes and looser encounter design than modern raids. The 40-player model was eventually reduced because it was difficult to organize and made individual performance harder to identify.