If you’ve jumped into The First Descendant’s massive 2026 content drop that added 3 new co-op raids and cross-progression across all platforms, you’re probably wondering how to add friends in The First Descendant to take on these challenging missions together. I’ve been grinding the game’s endgame content for 4 months straight, running everything from Void Intercept Battles to World Boss raids with groups of 4, and I’ve run into every possible quirk of the friend system along the way. This guide cuts through the confusion, covers all the 2026 changes to the social menu, and fixes the most common errors that stop players from connecting with their squad.
How to Add Friends in The First Descendant: 2026 Official Steps
The 2026 mid-year patch overhauled the entire social system to support cross-play between PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and Nintendo Switch, so the old platform-only friend adding method no longer works. You’ll now need to use your linked Nexon ID to send requests to players on any platform, which takes a few extra seconds but opens up a way larger pool of teammates for hard endgame content. The steps are straightforward once you know where to look:
For players who want to add someone they just played with in a random public match, you don’t have to type in their ID manually. Just go to the “Recent Players” tab in the Social menu, find their name, and select “Send Friend Request” directly from their profile card. That saves a ton of time if you hit it off with a random teammate who runs a great support build that pairs perfectly with your DPS character.
Fixes for Common Friend Request Errors in 2026
Even if you follow the steps exactly, you might run into errors that stop your request from sending or showing up for the other person. Most of these issues come from the 2026 cross-play update settings that are turned on by default for new players, so they’re easy to fix once you know what to look for. The most common issue I see is players trying to use their platform ID (like their PSN or Xbox Gamertag) instead of their Nexon ID, which won’t work for cross-platform requests.
First, make sure both you and the friend you’re trying to add have cross-play enabled in your settings. You can find this under the “Gameplay” tab in Settings, scroll down to the Cross-Play section, and toggle it on. If it’s turned off, you won’t be able to send or receive requests from players on other platforms, and you might not even see requests from players on the same platform in some cases. I ran into this exact issue last month when trying to add my friend who plays on PS5 while I’m on PC, and it took us 10 minutes to realize he’d turned cross-play off by accident when he first installed the update.
Another common error is the “request failed” pop-up that shows up when you hit send. This is almost always caused by one of two things: either the person you’re trying to add has hit their pending request cap of 20 incoming requests, or they have friend requests turned off entirely in their privacy settings. If you know the person IRL, send them a quick message outside the game to ask them to clear their pending requests or adjust their privacy settings so you can add them.
Best Practices for Managing Your Friend List for Co-op Runs
Once you’ve got a solid list of friends added, you’ll want to organize it so you can quickly find the right teammates for different mission types in 2026’s updated endgame. There’s no limit to how many friends you can have on your list, but scrolling through hundreds of names to find someone who runs a good healer build for the new Ice Queen raid is a huge waste of time between runs.
I recommend tagging your friends by their main role or the content they like to run, using the custom tag feature added in the 2026 patch. For example, you can tag players who main support builds as “Healer” or players who only run World Bosses as “World Boss Main” so you can filter your list in 2 clicks when you’re building a squad. You can also set your own status to show what you’re currently playing, so your friends know if you’re grinding for crafting materials or looking for a group to take on the new hard mode raid.
It’s also a good idea to unfriend players you haven’t played with in 3+ months, especially if they’re inactive. This keeps your list clean, and also makes sure you don’t hit the hidden 500 friend cap that a lot of players don’t know exists until they try to add someone new. If you’re looking for more players to add for specific content, the official The First Descendant community forum has dedicated LFG (Looking for Group) threads for every platform and mission type, where you can find players with similar goals and skill levels to add to your list.
How to Join Friends’ Lobbies and Start Missions After Adding Them
Adding someone to your friend list is only the first step – you need to know how to join their lobby or invite them to yours to actually play together. The 2026 update made this way easier than it used to be, but there are still a few settings you need to pay attention to if you don’t want random players joining your private squad runs.
To invite a friend to your lobby, go to the Social tab, find their name on your online list, and select “Invite to Lobby” from the drop-down menu. If you’re trying to join their lobby, select “Request to Join” instead, and they’ll get a notification to approve your request. If you’re running a private mission where you only want your pre-made squad to join, make sure you toggle the private lobby setting on before you start matchmaking, so random players can’t fill the empty spots in your group.
For cross-platform groups, make sure all players are in the same region before you start matchmaking, otherwise you’ll get a region mismatch error when you try to launch the mission. The 2026 update added region lock exceptions for pre-made squads, but you have to enable this in your settings first if you want to play with friends from other regions. Keep in mind that you might experience higher ping if you play with people from across the world, so it’s best to stick to players in your own region for high-stakes endgame raids where reaction time matters.
Learning how to add friends in The First Descendant is the first step to getting the most out of the game’s 2026 co-op content, from the new 8-player World Boss raids to the challenging hard mode Void Intercept Battles. The updated social system is way more flexible than the old version once you get the hang of it, and the cross-play support means you can play with all your friends no matter what platform they own. If you run into any issues we didn’t cover here, drop a comment below and we’ll help you troubleshoot so you can get back to grinding loot with your squad.