If you spent any part of the early 2000s sneaking onto the family computer to feed a digital pet before your sibling kicked you off, the next sentence is going to do something funny to your brain: Neopets is showing up in Fortnite.
It sounds like a fever dream, but it’s real. Aisha, the cat-like Neopet with the unmistakable antennae ears, is dropping into Fortnite as a Sidekick on July 2, 2026. Neopets confirmed it this week with a teaser that more or less broke the internet for a certain age bracket: “Neopia, meet Fortnite. Fortnite, meet Aisha.” Fortnite dataminers spotted the same July 2 date almost immediately, so this isn’t a “maybe someday” rumor. It’s locked in.
At this point, the old joke that everything eventually comes to Fortnite has stopped being a joke and started being a roadmap. A browser-based virtual pet site from 1999 is the latest entry on a guest list that already includes Star Wars, Marvel, and half of cable TV. Honestly, the fact that it took this long is the surprising part.
What’s Actually Happening With Neopets in Fortnite
The short version: Aisha is joining Fortnite as a Sidekick, the little companion pets that trot around next to your character. Given how small and animal-shaped most Neopets are, slotting them into the Sidekick system was the obvious move. Aisha fits right in next to the dogs, cats, and dragons already roaming the island.
Neopia, meet Fortnite. Fortnite, meet Aisha.
July 2, 2026 ⭐ pic.twitter.com/FwvQR4bwKP
— Neopets (@Neopets) June 23, 2026The first teasers only show Aisha, which strongly suggests this is the opening wave rather than the whole collaboration. Neopia is packed with hundreds of species, so if Aisha sells well, don’t be shocked to see a few more Neopets follow her through the portal. That’s exactly how Fortnite tends to operate: test the water with one cosmetic, then open the floodgates if the V-Bucks start flowing.
It’s worth noting this lands in the same lineage as Fortnite’s other licensed companions. The same system has already given us pint-sized versions of SpongeBob SquarePants, the Toy Story Alien, Adventure Time’s Peppermint Butler, Rick and Morty’s Snowball, and Itchy from The Simpsons. A Neopet was always going to feel at home in that crowd.
A Quick Refresher on Fortnite Sidekicks
If you’ve been away from Fortnite for a while, Sidekicks are newer than you’d think. Epic introduced them in November 2025 as part of the Chapter 6 Mini Season 2, the Simpsons-themed run, starting with a banana-dog named Peels in the Battle Pass. They’re an evolution of the old Pet Back Bling cosmetics, except now your companion actually walks beside you and reacts to the action instead of just clinging to your back.
The roster has exploded since then. As of mid-June 2026, there are roughly 49 Sidekicks in the game, and Epic keeps adding more nearly every week. If you want the complete, up-to-date rundown of every companion in the game, our breakdown of all Sprites in Fortnite tracks each one and how to unlock it.
Two things worth knowing before you get attached: Sidekicks are purely cosmetic, they don’t fight, can’t take damage, and give zero competitive edge, and other players can’t even see them, so your dollar (or V-Buck) is buying personal joy, not a flex. You also only get one shot at designing a Sidekick’s permanent traits, like coat color. Pick wisely, because changing your mind later means buying a second copy.
Neopets, For the Uninitiated and the Nostalgic
Here’s the context that makes “Neopets are coming to Fortnite” hit so hard for millennials.
Neopets launched in November 1999, dreamed up by Adam Powell and Donna Williams (who’d later marry) while Powell was a student in Nottingham. By Christmas of that first year, the site was already pulling in hundreds of thousands of page views a day. For a huge slice of an entire generation, it was a first taste of the internet as a place, somewhere you built communities, traded items, played Flash mini-games, and got weirdly invested in a world of faeries and adorable creatures. At its mid-2000s peak, Neopets was pulling around 35 million monthly users and even landed McDonald’s Happy Meal toys.
The brand has changed hands more times than most fans can keep straight, bouncing through Viacom, JumpStart, and NetDragon, and even brushing up against Scientology along the way. Since 2023, it’s been owned by World of Neopia Inc., the studio founded by Dominic Law after JumpStart shut down. Law, a lifelong player himself, bought the franchise, raised millions in funding, and set out to drag Neopets out of life support and back into relevance.
And it’s working. World of Neopia revived a pile of classic Flash games, signed John Legend as a brand ambassador, and partnered with Upper Deck on Neopets Battledome, a Pokémon-style trading card game built around the franchise’s combat system. The Fortnite collab is the next stage of that comeback, taking the brand somewhere a 1999 web game has no business being and somehow making it feel natural.
How to Get the Neopets Sidekick in Fortnite
Want Aisha in your Locker on launch day? Here’s the play:
- Update and launch Fortnite on your platform of choice, PC, console, or mobile, on or after July 2, 2026.
- Open the Item Shop from the main lobby menu.
- Find the Aisha Sidekick (and any other Neopets cosmetics in the same set). Like other Sidekicks, she’ll be sold for V-Bucks.
- Buy her, then equip her in your Locker under the Sidekicks section. From there she’ll tag along in supported modes: Battle Royale, LEGO Fortnite, Save the World, Fortnite Festival, and Creative.
That’s the whole process to get the Neopets Sidekick in Fortnite. No challenges to grind, no Battle Pass tiers to climb. At least based on what’s been revealed so far, this is a straightforward shop drop. One tip: keep an eye on the Item Shop rotation right around July 2, since exact timing within the day can vary by region.
What We Still Don’t Know
A few details haven’t been nailed down yet, so here’s where to keep your expectations honest.
Pricing. Epic hasn’t confirmed a number, but recent Sidekicks have typically landed between 1,200 and 1,500 V-Bucks (roughly $10–$14), with licensed and premium options sitting at the top of that range. SpongeBob currently holds the crown as the priciest one in the game. So budget closer to that bracket than to a bargain. The “it’s basically one avocado toast” math doesn’t quite hold up here, sadly.
Bundles. There’s no confirmation yet on whether Aisha comes solo or as part of a Neopets-themed bundle with extra cosmetics. Wait for the official shop listing before assuming.
Codes and crossover rewards. Neopets has a habit of tying in-game goodies to its own platform during collaborations, so it’s genuinely worth checking neopets.com and the official Neopets socials around launch. There may be a code or reward floating around on their end.
For now, this looks like a cosmetic-only crossover with no announced free rewards, challenges, or Battle Pass component.
Should You Care? (Probably, Yeah)
If Neopets was never your thing, Aisha is just another cute companion in a very long list, easy to skip. But if you’re one of the people who genuinely felt something reading that opening line, you already know the answer. This is nostalgia engineered to separate you from a handful of V-Bucks, and it’ll probably work.
And if the teaser nudged you to go back to Neopets rather than into Fortnite, good news: the site is alive and free to play at neopets.com, in better shape than it’s been in years.
While you’re stocking up on cosmetics, Fortnite’s crossover streak shows no sign of slowing. The Vini Jr. Fortnite skin is another recent drop worth grabbing if you’re building out your Locker. Between a Real Madrid superstar and a 27-year-old virtual pet sharing the same Item Shop, “everything comes to Fortnite” has never felt more literal.
Aisha lands July 2. Set a reminder, save your V-Bucks, and maybe pour one out for the family desktop that started it all.
