After months of speculation and days of social media teases leading up to the cast announcement, the official Survivor 50 cast has been unveiled – and we have to admit, we’re impressed with the variety of players CBS has tapped for the milestone season!
Leading up to the official cast announcement on CBS Mornings, the Survivor social media team had been working overtime to tease the seasons the returning castaways hailed from. It was a fun mix of both classic seasons and newer seasons, which was a nice surprise, as there was some concern we could end up seeing more newer players than OGs. Thankfully, CBS seems to have worked its magic and assembled a cast that is worthy of the historic 50th season of Survivor
Let’s not waste any more time beating around the bush! Here’s the complete list of players CBS announced to compete as part of the Survivor 50 cast:
Jenna Lewis Dougherty - Seasons 1 (Borneo) and 8 (All -Stars)
Colby Donaldson - Seasons 2 (The Australian Outback), 8 (All -Stars), 20 (Heroes vs. Villains)
Stephenie Lagrossa Kendrick - Seasons 10 (Palau), 11 (Guatemala), 20 (Heroes vs. Villains)
Cirie Fields - Seasons 12 (Panama-Exile Island), 16 (Micronesia - Fans vs. Favorites), 20 (Heroes vs. Villains), 34 (Game Changers)
Ozzy Lusth - Seasons 13 (Cook Islands), 16 (Micronesia - Fans vs. Favorites), 23 (South Pacific), 34 (Game Changers)
Benjamin “Coach” Wade - Seasons 18 (Tocantins - The Brazilian Highlands), 20 (Heroes vs. Villains), 23 (South Pacific)
Aubry Bracco - Seasons 32 (Kaoh Rong - Brains vs. Brawn vs. Beauty), 34 (Game Changers), 38 (Edge of Extinction)
Chrissy Hofbeck - Season 35 (Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers)
Christian Hubicki - Season 37 (David vs. Goliath)
Angelina Keeley - Season 37 (David vs. Goliath)
Mike White - Season 37 (David vs. Goliath)
Rick Devens - Season 38 (Edge of Extinction)
Jonathan Young - Season 42
Dee Valladares - Season 45 Winner
Emily Flippen - Season 45
Q Burdette - Season 46
Charlie Davis - Season 46
Tiffany Nicole Ervin - Season 46
Genevieve Mushaluk - Season 47
Kamille Karthigesu - Season 48
Joe Hunter - Season 48
Kyle Fraser - Season 48 Winner
In addition to these players, the cast will also feature two players from Survivor 49, as confirmed via the cast announcement. However, we will understandably not find out the identities of these two players until after the season concludes.
The cast features a perfect mix of players from past and recent seasons, which longtime host Jeff Probst told the CBS Mornings team was a key goal when casting the historic season.
“Here’s what we realized early on, that casting Survivor 50 was like casting the ultimate all-time movie, and you think about all the actors that are alive today that you could put in that movie, but there’s only so many roles. We wanted 50 to be a little bit of everything. We wanted to taste every flavor, every type of personality, all the eras. We went from 200 on a list to 100 to 80 to 50, and then those last 26 cuts were brutal cuts.”
Now that the cast has been announced, the next step is for filming to begin! Filming for Survivor 50 will be kicking off sometime in early June, with the announced cast heading out to Fiji. This is why we’ve seen CBS roll out the Survivor 50 cast with a larger-scale social media push, as it’s clear the network wanted to control the narrative and avoid cast leaks, which would inevitably arise when filming begins.
It's going to be interesting to see how the classic and new era players mix, and to see the players' strategies evolve. Given that some of these players have played the game multiple times already, we're eager to see if that will help or hurt them in the game, and it's going to be fun seeing how the newer players who previously only appeared once adapt to playing the game a second time now that their original strategies are out there for all to see.
Survivor 50 will arrive in early 2026 and after seeing who is coming back we spring cannot come soon enough!