@megsokay Published March 3, 2026, 8:00 a.m. ET Where to Stream: Outlander Powered by Reelgood More On: Outlander ‘Outlander’ Says Goodbye: Five Secrets We Uncovered on the Season 8 Set New On Starz February 2026 The Sexiest TV Shows Returning To Netflix, HBO Max, Hulu, and More In 2026 Starz’s Black Friday Deal 2025 is Here—Save 75% on 2 Months Outlander fans might not be quite ready to say goodbye to the Starz hit show, but stars Sam Heughan and Caitriona Balfe have been bidding a “drawn out farewell” to their characters for years now. In January 2023, Starz announced that Outlander had been renewed for an eighth and final season. Over three years later, Outlander Season 8 finally makes its debut this Friday, March 6. Meaning, Heughan and Balfe have to confront the emotional task of saying goodbye to Jamie and Claire all over again.
“The final season, shooting it, I think the whole thing was a process. You know, there was just this theme to it, which was goodbyes,” Sam Heughan told DECIDER last month. “Every day felt like a goodbye in some way, whether it was with a location or character or a crew member or actor. So yeah, there were a lot of goodbyes.”
“I mean, it’s funny, it’s been in stages, I guess,” Caitriona Balfe told DECIDER in January. “We obviously had such a big goodbye when we finished shooting [in September 2024], and I think we all, in our own way, did a thing that was sort of like helping us release it or say goodbye.”
“I went and did this like meditation yoga retreat thing. Sam went to the mountains, Sophie [Skelton] went to Africa, Richard [Rankin] started flying. I don’t know, everyone had their own version. We’ve all sort of been busy with our lives and other work for the last year,” Balfe continued. “It doesn’t feel like it’s been a continuous goodbye, so this feels like a new stage.”
“By the end of it, we came to terms with it,” Heughan said. You know, there were a lot of tears, but it does feel a bit like itching an old wound now, coming back to it and kind of having to say goodbye again.”
“It’s funny,” Balfe said, “I definitely felt like I was sort of fine with it and then yesterday I had to go somewhere and there was a picture of Sam and I, and it was like, ‘Farewell, Outlander!’ And I got all emotional again. So it’s going to be this whole other journey, I think this goodbye.”
DECIDER knows firsthand how long the journey has been for the actors. Besides following the series from its 2014 debut, we were privileged to visit the Season 8 set back in the summer of 2024. The actors were already going through the steps Heughan and Balfe described, learning to say goodbye to a major cornerstone of their lives, while feeling the anticipation of what’s next. Meanwhile, Heughan, Balfe, their costars, and the Outlander crew were cooking up what might be the biggest and most epic season of the Starz series yet.
Here are five little behind-the-scenes secrets, Season 8 teases, and fun little details we saw on the Outlander set back in 2024…
***Potential Outlander Season 8 spoilers ahead***
When DECIDER joined a number of other outlets to visit the set of Outlander in Scotland in 2024, we weren’t necessarily shocked to hear that the plan was to shoot different endings to prevent spoilers.
“What I believe is there are going to be multiple endings and we will choose one eventually,” Heughan told a round table in 2024. “We’re going to shoot various endings, but I don’t know which one they will use.”
Heughan confirmed that he does indeed know how Outlander author Diana Gabaldon intends to end the books, but that might not be how the Starz show rolls. “I think one of the ideas, one I’ve been asking for pushing for is very similar to like how Diana’s book will end,” he said.
“So I know Diana’s ending, obviously, and we won’t get all the books done, obviously. We’re on Season 8 and she’s still still writing.”
That was two years ago. When we caught up with the cast and crew of Outlander in 2026, everyone we spoke to confirmed that showrunner Matthew B. Roberts was still keeping them in the dark. (Well, except Young Ian actor John Bell, who then quipped he might have been lied to by the powers that be about the ending.)
“We do know how it ends,” Roberts told DECIDER. “I think it’s one of those things where you’re going to have to experience it and feel it, and then you get to make the decision how how the show ends all on your own.”
There are a number of new additions to Outlander Season 8 who could prove meddlesome for our heroes in their final chapter. Turlough Converney is real-life American revolutionary Benjamin Cleveland, Carla Woodcock plays a beautiful widow named Amaranthus, and, maybe most importantly, Kieran Bew will be a new character named Captain Cunningham who has settled on Fraser’s Ridge during Jamie and Claire’s time away.
“The enemy’s on the inside now,” Heughan teased back in 2024. “He’s coming from inside the Ridge.”
In real life, though, Kieran Bew is a long-time friend of the Outlander family and almost joined the cast numerous times over the years.
“It always feels a bit like the first day of school, even after all these years of doing it,” Bew told journalists on set in 2024. “But joining a show, with friends, really, and seeing them being so emotional, it’s quite strange because I haven’t been part of that journey. “
“I nearly was. I nearly joined in Season 1 — and another season as well — but it didn’t work out,” he said. (Cue theories about who the actor, who also plays Hugh the Hammer on House of the Dragon, was meant to almost be.)
“So I’m thrilled to be here because I feel like was getting ready to join and then I’ve just sort of watched them enjoy the world,” he said. “So I feel very lucky because I never thought it was going to happen.”
Starz has already released a few preview images for Outlander‘s eighth and final season and one of the most intriguing ones sees Brianna and William sharing a scene. Jamie’s two grown children have met in the past, but only Bree knew the truth about their connection. Back in 2024, Sophie Skelton shared that she was especially excited about this Season 8 scene.
“We just did a scene, Charles and I, last week, which is sort of Brianna showing him for the first time and telling him for the first time that he’s not alone in his experience,” Skelton said, before teasing potentially spoiler-y parts of their discussion. “I think it’s really nice now to be able in Season 8 to show that Brianna has been thinking about that this whole time and to show how much she’s grown.”
For Skelton, it also meant fulfilling one of Brianna’s deepest desires.
“I think for Brianna to have a proper sibling is something that she’s always craved,” Skelton said. “She was such a lonely child and it’s really nice for her to be able to kind of give that gift back to somebody else and help them learn from her mistakes.”
We’ve known for quite some time that Outlander star Caitriona Balfe would be making her official directorial debut in Season 8. Back in 2024, Sam Heughan was happy to share his thoughts on how she did.
“She runs a tight ship,” he joked before admitting it was “wonderful.”
“I think everyone was so excited. And she had a great mentor in Jan [Matthys], who directed the other episodes. He’s a Belgian director, so they worked closely together and it was great,” Heughan said. “Of course she’s a good director. She’s an actress, so she knows how to give notes. And it was fun, you know? You realize you have a shorthand with her.”
Balfe called the experience “amazing” and “so much fun.” After sharing how supported she was by everyone, Balfe then called out her costars’ talent.
“I’ve always appreciated what amazing actors everybody is — you see it when you’re in a scene with them — but then to be on the other side? I think I was like the weirdo at the monitor just being like —” Balfe said, miming sheer awe. “Because you see what they’re doing and I understand exactly what they’re going for and when they surpass your expectations it’s so exciting.”
You know who else surpassed our expectations?
If there’s one takeaway DECIDER took from visiting the set of Outlander Season 8, it’s how special stars Sam Heughan and Caitriona Balfe are. For over a decade, they’ve not just led Outlander with their incredible performances, but their top-tier class off-screen. When we got to set, Sam was ready for hugs and greetings for everyone. Caitriona had inside jokes with journalists who had been covering the show for ages. They truly are the epitome of old school charm and generosity.
More than that, though, they are beasts when it comes to the work. These two went from roundtable interviews with press to laser-fast live on-camera soundbites to their actual full day of work. The shot in the Outlander Season 8 trailer where they come out of their new house on the Ridge with Revolutionary War rifles like badasses? They were filming that during our set visit. Every time the director said, “Action,” they were on, and when the cameras weren’t rolling? They were just relaxed as you would be with any of your work pals chilling by the watercooler.
It’s a bittersweet time for Outlander fans. We’re finally getting more Jamie and Claire, but it’s also the end of Jamie and Claire. But it’s certainly not going to be the end of Sam and Caitriona, Sophie and Richard, and the rest of Outlander‘s extraordinary cast.
Outlander Season 8 premieres on Friday, March 6 on Starz.
