Borderlands 3

Borderlands 3 is the easiest possible drop-in co-op recommendation for shooter fans who want a long campaign without friction. The loot keeps coming, the missions keep moving, and playing with two to four people scales naturally because everyone is chasing their own builds anyway. It is not a game that demands tight coordination, which is either a selling point or a limitation depending on what you want from co-op. I would have included it in the main ten if the list were not already strong in the looter-shooter and action co-op spaces. As it stands, it is a genuine recommendation for anyone who wants something long, loud, and easy to pick up mid-campaign.

Borderlands 3 is still a good cross-platform co-op game. It is just no longer the best answer when Borderlands 4 exists and is actively supported. The campaign holds up, crossplay covers the main co-op experience, and the character variety is solid for a four-player group. If you can find it cheaply or already own it, there is no reason not to play it. If you are choosing between the two, buy the newer one.

Borderlands 3 is on this list because Borderlands 4 exists and some groups will have already played 4, or will find 3 on sale and wonder if it is worth their time. It is. The campaign co-op is polished, the four-player drop-in structure works cleanly, and the loot loop is arguably more refined here than anywhere else in the series before 4 arrived. I would not call it a must-buy in 2026 when the newer entry is sitting right above it, but if you find it discounted and your group missed it, an evening running Mayhem-level content with friends still holds up. Think of it as comfort food: familiar, reliable, and not trying to reinvent anything.

Borderlands 3 is not trying to be BG3. What it is trying to be is a ridiculous four-player loot co-op campaign where everyone leaves with better guns than they arrived with, and at that it absolutely succeeds. The skill trees are real, the class identities are distinct, and the moment-to-moment co-op flow is among the most polished on this list. It also solves a real problem for mixed-skill co-op groups because level scaling keeps weaker players relevant without punishing stronger ones. The writing runs hot and cold depending on your tolerance for a particular flavour of humour, but the mechanical loop holds up across a full playthrough.

Borderlands 3 is a borderline entry on this specific list, and I want to be honest about that. The world structure is more hub-and-zone than true open-world exploration, and if that distinction matters to your group, the games higher up this list serve the intent better. What Borderlands 3 does exceptionally well is the co-op loop itself: four players, individual loot drops, class synergies that reward paying attention to what your teammates are running, and a gun variety so extreme that the joke about a billion weapons is not really a joke. Native PS5 version, stable performance, and some of the smoothest drop-in co-op on the platform. A great game that just happens to be slightly adjacent to what this list is really about.

Borderlands 3 is the most content-complete loot-shooter on PS5 for squads who like shooting, looting, and theorycrafting builds together. Four DLC campaigns beyond the base game, full crossplay, instanced loot so nobody argues over drops, and a chaos-tier endgame for groups who stick around. The couch co-op caps at two players locally — online handles 3–4. It slotted as an honorable mention rather than a top-10 pick because Helldivers 2 and Deep Rock Galactic both offer tighter co-op design for the same audience. Worth considering seriously if your squad specifically wants the looter-shooter format, especially given how often it goes on sale.

Borderlands 3 is the pick when you want a complete co-op campaign with no live-service pressure. No seasonal FOMO, no rotating content to chase — just a finished, generous looter-shooter with full crossplay across PS5, Xbox, and PC. Loot Instancing is the detail that matters most in co-op: everyone gets their own drops, so there's no fighting over gear that works for your build. The game is in maintenance mode, meaning no new content since 2022, but that also means everything is already in. Cross-save via a Shift account works well. For groups who want to pick it up, play through it together, and walk away satisfied, this is exactly right.