
Steam news
Full Steam announcements and update articles for this title.
Steam Trading Cards - 11 cards, one for each fishing zone - from the Ocean to Mars
Craft cards into badges and unlock emoticons and profile backgrounds
5 Badge Levels - Silver through Rebirth Amber
1 Foil Badge - the Golden Seagull, for dedicated collectors
10 Emoticons - seagulls, fish, crew, and more
8 Profile Backgrounds - your favorite zones, now on your Steam profile
Cloud save corruption recovery menu
If your cloud save is corrupted, you'll now see a menu to help you decide what to do instead of automatically overriding with the local save — preventing potential progress loss.
Steam connection warning - if the game can't connect to Steam at startup, a message will warn you that some features won't be accessible
Active catch not progressing when using auto clicker while the active catch window is outside the mouse area
Open x5 eggs at a time - requested by multiple players
New seagull statistics - as requested
Seagull catch streak
Max seagull catch streak
New in-game detailed list of what resets with rebirths and what stays
2 new Excavation XP bonuses in the Gem Shop
1.7x for 3 days
2x for 14 days
Stack additively (both active = 2.7x), multiplicative with other upgrades
2 new Excavation XP multiplier bundles in the Gem Shop
Permanently increase Excavation XP by 50%
Permanently increase Excavation XP by 60%
Stack multiplicatively with each other
Camera improvements
Camera now auto-adjusts on PC & mobile when you unlock a new boat, to show all crewmates
Mobile camera position is now remembered separately for landscape and portrait orientations
Translation and font fixes
35 new excavation achievements (1232 → 1267)
Only in game, not on Steam as promised
Total rainbow rewards found statistic
Viewable in statistics and used for achievements
Automatically granted 1 rainbow reward for every 40 rewards found
Rainbow scanner
Unlock instructions tooltip - shows how to unlock locked upgrades
Includes support for rainbow rewards
Setting to make auto excavation work while the window is closed
Reworked excavation pricing with a dynamic pricing system
Some achievement requirements adjusted to reflect updated numbers after recent balancing
Fixed lag when opening the excavation shop
Fixed lag caused by rainbow text rendering
313 new Expansion upgrades, including Excavation XP Multipliers
You will be granted free upgrades based on your current progress
For example, if you had 10/20 on a fossils upgrade, after the update you'll have 25/50. If you had 20/20, you'll have 50/50
New excavation levels added - you will be granted free XP to match your current progress
Infinite upgrades for Gold, Silver, and Excavation XP Multiplier in excavation
New Excavation XP Multiplier bonus stat for crewmates
Buffed crewmate Silver per Second multiplier bonus - only takes effect for newly hired crewmates
Excavation shop prices were adjusted (mostly reduced) due to the shop expansion
Your current fossils currency was adjusted to reflect the updated shop prices
Fishing Speed bonus from excavation clock rewards can no longer be rainbow, as +100x fishing speed caused serious lag and looked weird
Improved display of very large/small numbers
Goldfish main ability now gives XP Multiplier instead of more fossils
Some texts were not translated
Auto play in excavation didn't stop when the window was closed
Rainbow Rewards in Excavation
Some rewards found in excavation will be rainbow rewards that give many times the regular reward value
Only fossils, treasure chests, and clocks can be rainbow (not currencies at this time)
Feature unlocked in the excavation shop
Increase value multiplier & spawn chance of rainbow rewards in:
Leveling in Excavation
Excavation Shop
Medal Shop
View your current value multiplier & spawn chance in the statistics tab
Added wiki page explaining the mechanic in-game
Lifetime VIP owners now receive 200 daily pickaxes instead of 100
Increased currency drop odds in Excavation by 2x, making it more satisfying and easier to complete daily quests
Reduced scanner achievement requirements for the last 2 steps (from 2000/3000 to 1500/2000)
Reduced crew squad equip cooldown to 1 hour (from 4 hours) and reduced gem skip cost from 50 to 25
Moved the transfer squad button so it no longer covers crewmate information
Holiday event tasks now always start/end on Sundays
Crew squad upgrades no longer reset after rebirthing in the Ascension Tree
Fixed dig indicators on mobile not disappearing when autoplay was enabled while in the excavation shop
Fixed animating texts not rendering for the first few frames when displayed
Crew Squads - have multiple crew squads with different builds and hot-swap them
You start out with only 1 squad slots, and you will unlock more via upgrades.
Increase the crew squat slots up to 9 in:
Medal shop(2 slots)
Ascension tree(4 slots)
Rebirth tree(2 slots)
8 New achievements - have 2-9 crew squads
Were not added to steam, only in game
New statistics - total crew count across all squads, squad count
Bug that key bindings will trigger while typing in an input field(naming a pet/redeeming code)
Christmas2025 - gives 200 gems - expires on 1.2.26
NewYear2026 - gives 10 eggs - expires on 1.2.26
Statistics category for current & previous Rebirth.
Statistics category for current & previous Day. (Resets at 6am, your local time)
Statistics category for current & previous Week. (Resets every monday at 12am/00:00, your local time)
Statistics category for previous Ascension.
Improved statistics collection system
Bug when pressing space key to open the active catch mini game, it would sometimes trigger a missed try.
Added support for mouse key bindings in addition to keyboard(from 2.4.4).
The current custom key bindings were reset - because of the internal changes to how the key binds work now - sorry about that but it had to be done.
Many players have expressed frustration when new Steam achievements are added during updates.
From now on, I will not add any new Steam achievements.
(You may still see new achievements inside the game itself, but I currently do not plan to add more.)
Customizable Key Bindings
You can now bind keys to quickly switch between all panels in the game.
Settings Options
Customize the key bindings.
Hide the new key-hint UI if you prefer a cleaner screen.
1 New Steam Achievement Added - The last Steam achievement forever.
Excavation Level 10(Didn't add the level 11/12 to Steam achievements)
(Note: I previously reduced the XP requirements for Excavation. Reaching Level 12 now requires about the same total XP as reaching Level 9 before.)
Minor bugs resolved.
Expanded the Excavation leveling system
Now each Excavation level give you +30% fossil income!
Added levels 10, 11, 12
Reduced XP required to lvl up in levels 1-8, levels 9-12 requires less xp as well, the overall leveling is smoother now
You will be automatically credited for the XP reduced per levels for lvls 1-8
For example if you were lvl 8 and logged into the new update, you might be lvl 9/10/11/12 instantly
Because of the extra income from excavation leveling, some fossil values were changed a bit to fit the change
Now you can earn pickaxes inside Chest Hunts
Changed the 8 star goldfish pet ability to be "Bomb Tool will always hit at least 1 undug tile in Excavation"
I did it because with the previous ability bomb was stronger than any method of clearing the stages, now its more balanced, and still strong.
The bomb will still be strong, but a smart play with all tools will be more efficient(manually or with the AI)
Translation changes
Bug where the next step for better fossil income upgrade in the Excavation shop displayed the wrong value(without pets bonus)
Bug where some UI didn't update sometimes in Excavation.
Added missing characters for the Korean language
Auto play for Excavation with 2 different modes
Random(selected tool) will randomly use the selected tool on random locations.
Smart will use all tools to smartly finish stages.
In order for the "Smart" mode to use the scanner, you need to enable the auto scanner preference.
While "Smart" auto play is on, rewards from excavation will be reduced by 35% to incentivize active play.
Will auto complete stages after 3 seconds(where you see the total rewards you earned)
To instantly complete it, turn the Automatically complete stages preference on.
Is useful for ones who want to get achievements fast.
New preferences
Show time to fill pickaxe storage now instead of the time until the next batch of pickaxes, you will see how many minutes and seconds until the pickaxe storage is full in real time.
Show reward popups useful in Auto Play where you don't want to get spammed by reward popups.
Added that if auto scanner use is on, and you didn't have the pickaxes to scan when the stage was created, it will automatically scan when you can afford it now.
Now you will earn away income(gold, silver, pickaxes, chest hunts) if your PC in sleep mode but the game is open
Reworked pet star abilities(buffed)
Reduced base cost of scanner by 5 pickaxes
The game will remember how many seconds are to the next auto-granted chest hunt, instead of resetting each time you open the game.
If the game was open for multiple days, the continuous day streak statistics might reset, if it happened to you, please contact me and I'll restore your streak
ExcavationReworkNovember - gives 200 gems - Expires on 10.12.2025
Pickaxe Storage increased
Base storage 30->300 pickaxes
Max Additional storage from excavation shop 100->200 pickaxes
Max Additonal storage from pets 105->200 pickaxes
Total max storage possible 235 pickaxes -> 700 pickaxes
Bomb effectiveness upgrade in the Excavation shop has changed
8 max upgrades -> 20 max upgrades
10% per each upgrade -> 5% per each upgrade
Max of 80% upgrade -> Max of 100% upgrade
The prices of the upgrades will be around the same, just added more steps in between to avoid large jumps(old 8th step cost=new 20th step cost)
The bomb tool in excavation now will also dig empty tiles
To prevent you wasting pickaxes when there are less than 10% non-empty tiles, the bomb will not work, and a message will be shown - If it wasn't the case, you would waste a lot of pickaxes digging random empty tiles.
The pet 13 star ability was changed from bomb effectiveness to "Bomb Tool will not dig empty tiles in Excavation"
Pets
Buffed the increase pickaxe storage abilities of the pets greatly
Excavation Levels
Bigger range of possible rewards that you can find in a level, for example in level 3 you can find 1-4 rewards now, this will make the scanner with its new feature more useful so you'll get information if to skip the stage or stay.
Slight XP changes requirements to level up
New tab in the Excavation wiki explaining exactly what each layer depth is to avoid confusion.
Added many new statistics for Excavation like time remaining to fill storage
New useful settings for Excavation
Hold to use tool - will allow you to more smoothly use your chisels/shovels without your finger getting hurt.
Show notification on full storage
Automatically move to next stage
Prevent bomb usage when ineffective - When there are few tiles left, the bomb will likely target already empty tiles and will result you wasting pickaxes.
Automatically use scanner
Scanner
Scanner will display reward count in current stage after used. (You'll have to buy an upgrade in order to get this feature for 1 million fossils)
Now scan area will disappear after all rewards inside of it are found.
Inconsistent bonus values when you have both short bonuses(seagulls, excavation clocks) with long bonuses(from gem shop)
Pet bond progress wasn't updated properly in the pet selection menu.
Fixed bug that completed a stage even if you didn't find all rewards in it
Update 2.4 - Quality of life - you can still suggest them on the Discord or Steam Forums.
Excavation - gives 400 pickaxes - Permanent code
ExcavationUpdate2025 - gives 200 gems - Expires on 1.1.2026
Excavation - New huge system
How to play:
you use the tools to dig into the mine to find rewards, you might need to dig multiple blocks in depth to reach the bottom, to reveal the reward
once you dug all the dirt that covers the reward you will get it
Types of rewards:
Fossils - you get the new fossils currency you spend it in the excavation shop to improve stuff
Clocks - you get timed bonuses like 10x gold for the next few minutes
Currencies - random currencies like :egg~1: :petFood: :gem~1: and more
Treasure Chests - depending on the chest rarity common, uncommon, rare, epic, legendary you will get tons gold/silver.
Tools:
Chisel dig 1x1 area of blocks, with 2 depth
Shovel dig 3x3 area of blocks, with 1 depth
Bomb will dig random blocks is useful to find parts of rewards so you'll know when to dig
Scanner after using it, you will get an hint on where is the reward
Levels:
You get 1 xp for each mine stage completed(found all rewards in the stage)
Each level has different perks more rewards, bigger stage size
3 New pets with Excavation bonuses Crow, Goldfish, Zebra
167 New Achievements related to the new excavation system.
2 new crewmate bonus types
Treasure Chests drop x% more :silver:&:gold: in Excavation.
Clock Rewards are x% longer in Excavation.
Added option to render seagulls above UI.
It will be enabled by default for current and new players.
You can turn it off in the video section of the settings.
New shading for some of the skins so they are also visible at night.
Increased max quest board level to 8->11.
Fixed cloud save syncing problems, it should now perfectly sync with other devices.
Performance optimizations for the Docks zone.
Fixed crashes in the docks zone in phones/tablets.
The star indicator for the best daily zone, is now only includes already unlocked zones.
Improved cloud save functionally
Improved the UI for mobile especially for tablets.
Fixed that the chest hunt & fish caught related achievement stats were lower than the ones in the statistics the achievement stats were automatically updated to their correct values.
Improved the calculations for the continuous days played stat not its not affected by time zone.
Update 2.3 - Quality of life - you can still suggest them on the Discord or Steam Forums.
About
This page aggregates Steam news feeds, patch notes, and developer announcements for Idle Fishing, sourced from official Steam community posts.
Major updates, balance changes, and seasonal events often correlate with player-count spikes — cross-reference announcements here with the live charts on the main Idle Fishing statistics page.
Articles link back to Steam for full changelogs. SteamScope refreshes news entries as new posts are published to the game's Steam hub.