Survivor Ghost Island: Will the Final 15 swap into two tribes or three?

Although there is no confirmation by CBS at this time, there are some contextual clues about the next tribe swap for Survivor Ghost Island’s Final 15.

Warning: This piece will likely contain minor spoilers for the Survivor Ghost Island episode 6 tribe swap in discussing the number of tribes.

Survivor has been changing things up over the past few years when it comes to tribe swaps. Last season, Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers, saw three tribes swap into three more tribes for the first time in the show’s history, showing a brand new dynamic in what then was the 35th season of the show.

With Ghost Island, however, Survivor finds themselves in a situation where they have plenty of options. We’ve seen two tribes swap into two tribes first, something that hasn’t happened in a 20-player season since Caramoan (and it took five vote-outs and one evacuation to get there). With roughly two more eliminations before 13 players likely merge for a 10-player jury (the current standard), will the Ghost Island castaways swap into two tribes or three?

The promo for the next episode of the season insists that there’s a new twist and that there’s a “brand new start to Ghost Island.” While it seems like they want you to think that there’s a new evolution of the physical location and the curses within, one clue from Boston Rob on Twitter back when the season began suggests that it could be a third new tribe altogether.

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As you can see from the buffs worn by his daughters, there is an orange buff, purple buff, green buff and black buff visible. With just two tribes introduced so far and a tribe swap happening to kick things off next episode, logic dictates that there will be three tribes of five introduced in the next episode.

Next: Survivor: Ranking all 35 seasons

This isn’t the first time that Boston Rob has tweet an image of the buffs for a season before it even begins. In Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers, the Mariano family confirmed that the blue, red and yellow buffs would be joined in a purple merge buff last season, which ended up being the case once more.