A disappointing spell has been cast over the future release schedule for HBO’s Harry Potter series.

For several years now, HBO has been working on launching an adaptation of the Harry Potter books, with season 1 based on the first novel, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, and each successive season adapting the next book in the series. Production on season 1 began in 2025, filming is still ongoing, and the episodes are slated to be released in 2027, although an exact release date has not been announced yet.

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Casey Bloys, Chairman and CEO of HBO and Max content, indicated that the Harry Potter series will not be released on an annual basis. Unlike The Pitt, which is returning annually with 15 episodes per season, he explains that “it’s just not possible” for shows like Harry Potter, House of the Dragon, and The Last of Us to be releasing new seasons every year. He clarifies that it is not for lack of trying, but because of how complicated these big-budget series are to make. Check out Bloys’ comments below:

You have to balance it. For some of the bigger shows like Harry Potter or House of the Dragon, or The Last of Us, huge world-building shows, it would be nice to have those on an annual basis. But from a production point of view, it’s just not possible. It’s not that everybody involved is just taking their time and sitting around. These shows are complicated to do. In order to bring a show back on an annual basis, you do have to start from the beginning with people who know how to do it, people like [The Pitt executive producer] John Wells or Greg Berlanti, and it’s helpful if there are not dragons that need to be rendered, or zombies and things like that.

The two other HBO shows that Bloys mentions, House of the Dragon and The Last of Us, have released new seasons every other year so far. House of the Dragon‘s seasons have come in 2022, 2024, and 2026, while The Last of Us has released its seasons in 2023 and 2025, and it has been confirmed that season 3 of the post-apocalyptic show based on the hit video game sequel will not return until 2027. Harry Potter will seemingly follow in their footsteps and likely debut new seasons bi-annually.

While this is not surprising given the blockbuster scale of HBO’s Harry Potter, it does mean that the show will need to run for more than a decade if the adaptation of each of the seven books takes approximately two years to release. Given the amount of source material and one season per book approach, Harry Potter is intended to last far longer than House of the Dragon, The Last of Us, or even Game of Thrones. HBO has invested in the long-term success of this new iteration of the Wizarding World and that it will still be going strong for many years to come.

Another aspect of a bi-annual release schedule is what it means for the cast of HBO’s Harry Potter. Dominic McLaughlin, Alastair Stout, Arabella Stanton, and the other new young stars are now poised to be making the show into their mid to late twenties. They will be older than Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson were, as they were in their early twenties when the Harry Potter movies ended.

For the time being, the focus is on Harry Potter season 1, and whether it can fulfill the promise of a more faithful adaptation that does the source material justice. A strong start is essential for the show’s future, but so are the questions of longevity that come with releasing new seasons every other year.