Cyberpunk: Edgerunners takes place in Night City from 2075 to 2076, with its last four episodes set in 2076 after a time skip. That puts the whole series before Cyberpunk 2077, whose story is set in 2077, while Edgerunners 2, premiering on 20 October, has no official year at all.
Pick your path: the years · before or after 2077 · the time skip · Edgerunners 2
Spoilers: this post covers the time skip in episode 7 and the year of Rebecca's death in episode 10, plus Cyberpunk 2077 lore dates. The first two sections give years only; story details sit behind taps.
Want to put yourself inside Cyberpunk: Edgerunners? YourCrush.AI turns this post's original character recipe, Petra Lindqvist, into someone you can talk to.
When does Cyberpunk Edgerunners take place?
Cyberpunk: Edgerunners takes place in Night City from 2075 to 2076, with episodes 7 to 10 set in 2076 after a time skip. That puts the whole series before Cyberpunk 2077, whose story is set in 2077, per Wikipedia's entry on the series and its entry on the game.
Cyberpunk: Edgerunners is a 10-episode anime set in Night City between 2075 and 2076, one to two years before the events of the game Cyberpunk 2077. Episodes 1 to 6 are set in 2075, and part 1 of the story tells them in order. The year changes once, at the start of episode 7.
Spoiler: the year of Rebecca's death
TheGamer dates Rebecca's death to "2076, one year before the events of Cyberpunk 2077" (TheGamer). It happens in the final episode, and Rebecca's own post tells how.
How YourCrush.AI lets you hear Night City's history from someone who lived it
YourCrush.AI lets you build an old fixer who has seen the city's crews come and go and ask her about any of them, using the no-code form at our character builder. The recipe below is an original adult character; her history is kept general on purpose so it never contradicts canon.
YourCrush.AI gives every character a backstory field, and that is where Petra's forty years of crews go. YourCrush.AI keeps pinned memories, so the crew you asked about yesterday is still the one she picks up with tonight. YourCrush.AI also sends voice messages, so her stories can arrive in a voice rather than a wall of text. Joining is free. Copy these fields into the form:
- Name: Petra Lindqvist
- Category: Anime
- Behaviour mode: natural
- Traits: Patient, Intelligent, Sarcastic, Honest, Curious
- Speaking style: slow, wry, exact, storyteller
- Description: Petra Lindqvist is a 66-year-old retired Night City fixer who worked the city for four decades and keeps a paper ledger of every crew she ever hired. She is dry, patient and exact about who did what, and she will not round a story up to make it better. She pours tea instead of anything stronger and charges for nothing except lies. She treats you as someone who has come asking about a crew from before your time.
- Backstory: Petra stopped taking jobs the year her ledger had more crossed-out names than live ones. She still keeps it, offline, because paper cannot be hacked. Most of the crews in it are dead, a few are famous, and one or two still owe her money. She has decided you are worth telling the true versions to.
- Greeting: Petra pours tea instead of anything stronger and slides an old paper ledger across the table, the kind nobody can hack. "You asked who ran this block before the gangs you know. Pick a page. Every crew that took a job from me is in there, and most of them are dead. Ask me about one and I'll tell you how it ended."
Is Edgerunners before or after Cyberpunk 2077?
Before. Edgerunners ends in 2076, and Cyberpunk 2077 picks up a year later. The game itself shows the gap: TheGamer notes that David's ripperdoc "is no longer in business by the start of the game's story in 2077."
That line comes from TheGamer's list of Edgerunners references in the game, and it's the best way to feel the year between them. Walk Night City as V and the show's locations are still standing. The people who filled them aren't.
Spoiler: Edgerunners traces in Cyberpunk 2077
A player in 2077 can find David's apartment building in Arroyo with the Edgerunners symbol on the wall, Doc's clinic closed, a drink at the Afterlife named after David, Lucy's rooftop, the apartment Rebecca shared with Pilar, and Rebecca's shotgun Guts in Corpo Plaza, all on TheGamer's list. CBR sums it up: "David may be gone, but his legacy lives on within various points of Night City" (CBR). He does not appear in the game as a living character.
Is there a time skip in Edgerunners?
Yes. Episode 7 jumps forward to 2076, months after episode 6. When the story picks back up, David is leading Maine's old crew, he's well known, and he's running heavier chrome, including Maine's arm implants, per Wikipedia.
The length of the skip is where most fan timelines go wrong. Wikipedia says "months after" and stops there, so anyone claiming "one year later" is guessing. TheGamer's "one year before Cyberpunk 2077" measures something else entirely: the gap between 2076 and the game, not the length of the skip itself.
Three scenes show what the skip actually does. The first is the end of 2075.
Spoiler: how 2075 ends for the crew
On the episode 6 job, Maine succumbs to cyberpsychosis, fatally injures his partner Dorio, then blows himself up to cover the crew's retreat, per Wikipedia's episode summary. Whoever survives is short on people and short on a leader.
The second is the cut itself. Anyone who knew the old crew would barely recognise the man now running it.
Spoiler: what changed after the time skip
In 2076 David runs Maine's old crew and is well known in Night City, and the arms on his body are Maine's own implants (Wikipedia). The showrunner has said he is 18 now, up from 17 at the start, as Game Rant reports. The rest of 2076 is told in the Edgerunners ending.
The third is the last night of the series, at Arasaka Tower.
Spoiler: what happens in 2076
In 2076, at the end of the series, Adam Smasher kills Rebecca and David during the assault on Arasaka Tower (Wikipedia). A year later, the game begins.
Why is there a skip at all? No source gives a production reason, and I've never found one. What it does in the story is clear enough: it turns David from the kid who joined Maine's crew into the man running it with Maine's chrome on him. My reading is that setting the show a year or two before the game also lets it end with its crew dead and the city unchanged, which is what CBR means by "fighting a losing battle against the system" (CBR).
When does Edgerunners 2 take place?
Nobody has published an official year for Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2. Neither Wikipedia nor Anime Corner's trailer coverage says whether it lands before or after the first series. CD Projekt Red describes it only as a standalone series set in the world of Cyberpunk 2077.
Wikipedia's Edgerunners 2 entry gives no year, and Anime Corner's trailer report does not place it either. CD PROJEKT RED's July 2025 announcement calls it "a new standalone anime series set in the world of Cyberpunk 2077". The release date, episode count and new crew are in our Edgerunners 2 release and cast post, so this post stays on the year.
A fan theory reads the "II" in the poster logo as 2071, which would make it a prequel. Nothing official supports it. The official material does describe Weak Kingsley as a man "once known as 'King'" who is now a washed-up legend living without chrome. That tells you he has a past in the city. It says nothing about which year that past was.
Is Cyberpunk Edgerunners canon?
Yes. CD PROJEKT RED confirmed during a Night City Wire special in September 2022 that the show is canon, calling it "100 percent canon for the Cyberpunk 2077 universe" in TheGamer's report. The studio behind the game co-produced the series, and the game treats its events as part of Night City.
Writer and producer Bartosz Sztybor put it plainly on a Night City Wire stream, quoted by Looper: "It's the same city. Same streets, same cars, same guns." The game backs that up. Patch 1.6, the "Edgerunners Update" of 6 September 2022, "added some secrets related to the Cyberpunk: Edgerunners anime series to be discovered in Night City," according to the official patch notes. Those secrets run from David's jacket to Rebecca's shotgun.
It also won as the thing it is. Wikipedia's account of the 7th Crunchyroll Anime Awards calls it "the first video game adaptation and prequel series to win" Anime of the Year.
Where does Edgerunners fit in the wider Cyberpunk timeline?
In the game's lore, Arasaka hired Adam Smasher in 2022 to fight in the Fourth Corporate War, and Game Rant dates his killing of Johnny Silverhand to the raid on Arasaka Tower on 20 August 2023, a memory the game itself treats as unreliable. Edgerunners follows in 2075 and 2076, and Cyberpunk 2077 in 2077.
Ask when does Cyberpunk Edgerunners take place against the game's whole history, and this table is the answer.
| Year | Event | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Late 20th century | Adam Smasher born, in game lore | Game Rant |
| 2022 | Arasaka hires Smasher for the Fourth Corporate War | Game Rant |
| 20 August 2023 | Arasaka Tower raid; Game Rant says Smasher kills Silverhand (memory unreliable in the game) | Game Rant |
| 2075 | Edgerunners episodes 1 to 6 | Wikipedia |
| 2076 | Time skip; episodes 7 to 10; Rebecca and David die | Wikipedia, TheGamer |
| 2077 | Cyberpunk 2077; Doc's clinic closed | Wikipedia, TheGamer |
| Edgerunners 2 | No official year; 2071 is a fan theory only | Wikipedia |
The real-world dates run the other way round from the story's. The series was announced on 25 June 2020 and released on Netflix on 13 September 2022 (Wikipedia), a week after Patch 1.6 arrived on 6 September, the date on the official patch notes. Edgerunners 2 was announced on 4 July 2025 at Anime Expo (CD PROJEKT RED) and premieres on Netflix on 20 October 2026, per the official Edgerunners 2 page.
Frequently asked questions
How long is the time skip in Edgerunners?
The show never gives an exact figure, just months. Episode 7 picks up in 2076, months after episode 6, according to Wikipedia.
What year does Cyberpunk 2077 take place?
2077, the year after Edgerunners ends.
Is Edgerunners 2 a prequel?
Nothing official says so. No year has been announced, and the prequel theory traces back to a fan reading of the logo.
When did Cyberpunk Edgerunners come out?
Netflix released it on 13 September 2022, a week after the game's Edgerunners Update, Patch 1.6, landed on 6 September.
How old is David at the end of Edgerunners?
The showrunner has said he is 18 after the time skip, as reported by Game Rant.
More from Cyberpunk: Edgerunners
- Read the full story: What is Cyberpunk Edgerunners about? The story from Gloria's death to the time skip
- How old is Lucy in Edgerunners, and what happened to her after the Moon?
- Who is Adam Smasher? Arasaka's cyborg, his age, and what he does in Edgerunners
- Also on YourCrush: Fall 2026 anime: 16 shows, every date checked, and which to skip
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