Zomboid 42.22 Update: Ladders, Crowbar Forcing, Fixes

Short answer: Project Zomboid Build 42.22.2 went Stable on November 9, 2026. There are two headline features. (1) Ladders: you can climb the ladders placed on the map with the E key. (2) Crowbars: from the right-click menu you can force open locked windows, doors, garage doors and gates. Beyond that, more actions can be done while walking, and many animal and multiplayer bugs are fixed. This article only collects what the official Steam posts (from the developer, The Indie Stone) say, and we have not tested it in the game.

The previous Stable was 42.21 (September 28, 2026). 42.22 appeared on the Pre-Release branch (a test branch) on October 27, went through hotfixes 42.22.1 on November 4 and 42.22.2 on November 6, and moved to Stable on November 9. The hotfix posts say the update "should not break saves." Even so, it is wise to back up a long-running save before updating (the official Pre-Release post also recommends backups).

Ladders: climb with the E key

• Controls: interact with ladders placed on the map using the E key. The Pre-Release post says this makes it easier to get out of empty pools and lets you see the view from the top floor of the Rosewood Fire Station.
• Official framing: the post calls it the "first rung" of ladder implementation, so expect more work on it.
• Footsteps: the Stable notes add a ladder footstep sound that varies with the ladder's material and your footwear.
• Not confirmed: whether players can craft and place ladders, or carry them, is not stated in the posts we could read.

Crowbars: force open locked entrances

• Controls: with a crowbar, use the right-click menu to force open locked windows, doors, garage doors and gates.
• What cannot be forced: security doors and jail cell doors are made of stronger stuff (Pre-Release post).
• Burglars: the Burglar profession is handier and quieter with a crowbar than the average survivor.
• Strength: Strength helps, as it does when opening jammed windows, and weaker characters struggle more.
• Failure: the more times you fail at forcing something, the higher the chance of damaging the crowbar.
• Not confirmed: the success formula, the time it takes, the noise level and how fast the crowbar wears down are not given in the posts we could read, so we do not state numbers.

Actions you can do while walking (7)

The "Balance" section of the Stable notes lists the following actions that can now be taken while walking.

The Pre-Release post singles out opening ammo boxes while walking as something many players had requested.

Other changes (from the Stable notes)

Items in hand and pushing

• The post says characters can now push while both hands are full of heavy items, but drop the items that would otherwise prevent the push.
• The notes give these rules: holding two heavy items drops the primary one; holding a flashlight and a heavy item drops the primary item; holding two flashlights drops the primary one.

Sleep, lighters and radios

• Sleep: while a "Bad Smell" moodle is active, the sleep option is disabled (with an explanatory tooltip).
• Lighters: a recipe was added to refill lighters using gasoline, a funnel and a surface to put them on.
• Makeshift radios: player-crafted Makeshift Radios and Makeshift Walkie Talkies now use the encumbrance of their tiles instead of a random value. The Makeshift Walkie Talkie item value changed to 5.
• Raccoon skulls: can be used in the animal skull necklace recipes.
• Flashlights: lenses now show On/Off textures.
• Metal sawing recipes: several were consolidated, allowing more inputs and reducing recipe clutter.

Animal and crafting fixes

• Animals: fixed animals dying when their cell unloads while the player is away, rabbit kits starving because does produced no milk, and chickens disappearing from full hutches. Does now produce milk for their kits, but characters cannot milk them, the same as pigs.
• Strength XP: fixed Strength XP not being awarded from "Cut down Tree" in the right-click menu (it was already awarded with manual aiming).
• Appliances: fixed toasters and coffee machines working without grid or generator power. The notes say, "No more battery powered toasters and coffee machines, sorry."
• Deadbolts: fixed the inability to lock external doors from inside without a key, so deadbolts work again.
• Car keys: fixed keys appearing next to untouched cars.
• Barricades: fixed un-barricading letting planks exceed your inventory capacity.
• Fishing: fixed being locked into fishing mode when using the rod as a weapon next to water.

Multiplayer fixes

• Doppelganger character: fixed a character being duplicated at the edge of a chunk and potentially killed.
• PvP damage: damage calculations moved server-side, fixing damage not being applied correctly.
• Maps: fixed the sandbox option "All Known On Start" in multiplayer, and notes written on map items vanishing after the map was put into a container and taken out. Maps that were unreadable inside a container are also fixed.
• Trailers: several trailer physics and towing desync fixes.
• Stability: several crashes and errors were fixed, including dedicated servers freezing with "Entity is already registered." Server backups are also faster.
• Anti-cheat: the notes say "even more cheats guarded against."

For modders and server admins

• Tile definitions: all tile definitions moved into a tile_definitions subfolder in /media. The .tiles files were removed and are now generated from .txt.
• Custom maps: can now include Town Preview videos.
• Sorting: TimSort and PZArrayList were removed, because current Java sort algorithms make them redundant.
• Java integrity checks: JRE integrity checks were added to detect modifications to the Java Runtime Environment; alterations are shown in the version watermark. They arrived in the 42.22.1 hotfix, and 42.22.2 fixed the checks wrongly displaying "attached" on Windows.
• Release process: new updates will go to the Pre-Release branch (formerly Unstable) first and stay there for at least a week before moving to Stable, barring urgent hotfixes.

What we could not confirm

• In-game behavior: how ladders and crowbars feel, success rates, noise and crowbar wear were not checked by running the game.
• The full forum patch notes: we could not retrieve the The Indie Stone forum page the post points to. What is written here is limited to what the Steam posts contain.
• Mod compatibility: we did not check which mods work on 42.22.2. Check the supported Build on each mod page.
• Our existing articles: articles written for Build 42.21 have not each been re-checked against 42.22.

Sources

• Steam: 42.22.2 STABLE Released (Nov 9, 2026; full notes)
• Steam: Moving on Up: 42.22 Pre-Release (Oct 27, 2026; ladders, crowbars, the Pre-Release process)
• Steam: 42.22.1 Pre-Release Hotfix Released (Nov 4, 2026)
• Steam: 42.22.2 Pre-Release Hotfix Released (Nov 6, 2026)

Summary

• 42.22.2 went Stable on Nov 9. It adds ladders (E key) and crowbars (right-click to force open locked windows, doors, garage doors and gates). Security doors and jail cell doors cannot be forced.
• You can open ammo boxes, open or close an umbrella, swap batteries and more while walking (7 actions).
• Many animal, multiplayer and lock-related bugs are fixed. Back up a long-running save before updating.

Related: Livestock and animal care, Firearms and ammo chart, Choosing B42 mods