Marathon is testing a two-week duo queue on Perimeter, but you’ll need a premade partner
Bungie announced a short, experimental duo queue for Marathon that players can try starting March 18 at 12pm CT. The test will run for two weeks, though the studio said it might end the trial early or extend it depending on what the team learns. Marathon’s game director, Joe Ziegler, shared the plan on X. For this test Bungie limited the mode to a single map, Perimeter, and only allowed premade two-player crews. That means you must invite a friend into the lobby and select the dedicated Perimeter, Duo queue to match against other duos. Solo matchmaking into the duo pool is not enabled for this experiment.
Alright everyone we're going a bit rogue here. We have a bit of an experimental feature that's in development we want to test and we'd love for you to help. As of Wednesday morning 3/18 at 10am PT, we'll be enabling a limited time duos queue on Perimeter only to test how the game…
— Ziegler (@Ziegler_Dev) March 16, 2026
Ziegler warned players that the feature is intentionally simple and that some elements could be rough around the edges. “Just a note: this is a bit of an experimental feature so we expect to learn some things along the way and make changes to future versions of this,” he wrote. How Bungie uses the results will shape whether duos become a permanent queue. The developer said it wants to expand duos beyond this narrow test and refine how the mode works, but it gave no firm timeline. Depending on findings and follow-up work, a fuller duos implementation could arrive in a later season.
Bungie has been running other live tests and community-facing events as part of Marathon’s rollout. Players interested in the game’s launch and creator events can read our coverage of the Tau Ceti Cup showmatch, and our primer on Marathon’s launch windows and platform plans is available in this report.
If you plan to try the duo queue, remember it will only match premade pairs on Perimeter while the experiment runs. Bungie encouraged players to report issues and give feedback so the team can iterate.
Tell us what you think in the comments, and follow us on X, Bluesky, YouTube, Instagram.
Marathon
Developed by Bungie
A PvP-focused extraction shooter set on the mysterious planet of Tau Ceti IV, Marathon will see players inhabit the bodies of Runners, cybernetic mercenaries who have been designed to survive the planet’s harsh environments and explore the lost colony that once inhabited Tau Ceti’s surface. Players will engage solo or in crews of three, searching for mysterious alien artifacts, as well as for valuable loot and new weapons and gear that they can add to their collection.
- Genre: Shooter
- Platforms: Xbox Series X|S, PC (Microsoft Windows), PlayStation 5
- Modes: Multiplayer, Battle Royale
- Publisher: Bungie
-
Age Rating:
GRAC 15+
