Borderlands 4 side missions expected to be as big as DLCs from past games

Speaking in an interview with IGN at Gamescom 2025, Borderlands 4 studio head Randy Pitchford confirmed that the upcoming looter-shooter will have some side missions that will be surprisingly ambitious. In fact, Pitchford claimed that many of these will be as big as DLCs from past games. This makes sense, considering this is the biggest entry yet in the series.

Read on to learn just how ambitious Borderlands 4 side quests could be. Here are the details.

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Borderlands 4 to feature thrice as many side quests as before, with many the size of DLCs

Expect a ton more side content than ever seen before in the series' history (Image via 2K)

When asked about the number of side missions in the game, here's what Randy said:

"With the side missions, we have not just doubled down but tripled down. There's a multitude more than we have done before."

This seemingly implies that players will hit triple-digit numbers in hours when it comes to beating the game 100%. He continued:

"Some of them are just quick, almost instantaneous, fun little side things. Others are full, drawn-out adventures, the length of some of our (past) DLCs - all for just a side quest outside of the main story beat."

The series has had tons of add-on content since the first game's debut, with some popular picks like The Secret Armory of General Knoxx (Borderlands), Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep (Borderlands 2), and Love, Guns, and Tentacles (Borderlands 3). Each of these is roughly around five-to-eight hours in length.

On the flip side, there have also been more bite-sized ones, like the Headhunter DLCs in Borderlands 2, which are roughly an hour long. Given the significance of bringing them up as part of the conversation, Pitchford could be referring to the former, which would certainly be impressive, and does track with the rest of the game's ambition.

After all, Borderlands 4 is the biggest series entry yet from developer Gearbox Software, this time featuring a seamless open-world on the all-new planet of Kairos. With plenty of dynamic events and other content to keep players busy, lengthy side quests will no doubt help immerse them further in the world and its lore, on top of the chaotic FPS action and loot grind.

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Borderlands 4 launches on September 12, 2025, for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X|S. The Nintendo Switch version arrives on October 3, 2025.