Nexus Mods' new owner: 'mods will always be free'

Details on Nexus Mods' new management have been revealed, with the site's new owner echoing Dark0ne's sentiments around mods, community, and monetization.

Nexus Mods' new owner: 'mods will always be free'
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Senior Gaming Editor
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2-minute read time
TL;DR: Nexus Mods has new ownership under Chosen and a leadership team committed to preserving free mod access, reducing ads, and maintaining the existing premium membership model. The team emphasizes community trust, avoiding aggressive monetization, and supporting mod authors to sustain the platform's legacy and user engagement.

Nexus Mods is now under new ownership, and the modding community is hoping the old adage "meet the new boss, same as the old boss" rings true here.

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Premiere PC mod hosting site Nexus Mods recently changed hands and is currently being run by a new team, with site owner Robin Scott aka Dark0ne citing burnout as the reason for him stepping down. The new owners of the site recently introduced themselves to the community in an announcement post.

Nexus Mods is now owned by Chosen, a somewhat-mysterious figure, who has put together a triumvirate of leaders to run the site: Foledinho, Rapsak, and Taagen, as they're known by their website usernames. The team's reveal post aims to assuage community worries around monetization, ads, and premium subscriptions--will Nexus Mods be bogged down with money-making strategies?

According to Foledinho, the team wants to run fewer ads, not more, and that mods will "always remain free."

"We're here to honor [Dark0ne's] legacy and carry it forward, but we need to earn your trust," one-third of Nexus Mods' management said.

A big part of fostering that trust is how Nexus Mods chooses to make money and keep doing what it does best--hosting the user creations that feed engagement, playtime, and fun.

"Monetization is hard and Nexus Mods is a complex platform. What matters most is continuing to support mod authors, delight users, and keep the lights on. We're not changing the core model. No aggressive monetization. No paid mods. If anything, we're aiming for fewer ads, not more. We'll take a community-first, listening approach, and we won't compromise on what's made Nexus Mods special."

Premium memberships won't change under the new leadership, though, and lifetime subscriptions won't be changed: "Lifetime Premium means lifetime and it's safe," Foledinho said, and there are no changes in the works.

"Hosting billions of mod files and running the infrastructure behind Nexus Mods isn't cheap. The site was monetized early back in 2007 with premium memberships and honestly, we think it was done right. We have no plans to change the core of how premium works."

It'll be interesting to see how this unfolds over time, especially as more video games start relying on generative AI and collections of in-game assets that can be used to create user-generated content in closed platforms, potentially alleviating the need for external mods.