'Survivor' Makes Big Rules Change, Jeff Probst Explains Why It Finally Happened in 2023

There has been a big change to Survivor and longtime host Jeff Probst is sharing his thoughts.

In the past, each episode of Survivor would feature two challenges – a reward challenge and then an immunity challenge. In recent years, there is only enough time for one challenge each week, so reward is often tied to an immunity win.

Whenever a tribe has more team members than other tribes, they need to have people sit out of challenges in order to make the competitions even. In those early years, one person could not sit out back-to-back challenges in an episode.

Now that there are no longer two challenges in each episode, a change has been made to the rules.

Keep reading to find out more…

Jeff announced during the episode on Wednesday night (October 4) that teams cannot have the same person sit out of challenges in back-to-back immunity challenges.

“In the early seasons of Survivor, there were always two challenges: a reward challenge and an immunity challenge,” Jeff told Entertainment Weekly. “The sit-out rule was designed to force a critical decision, because if you sat out of the reward challenge, you were forced to compete in the immunity challenge. So it came down to strategy. If you really wanted to win [a] reward, you might sit out your weakest player, but if you did, that weak player would then have to run in the immunity challenge. And Tribal Council was always the reset, which meant it was a clean slate with the next challenge.”

“In this new era, we often only have one combined reward/immunity challenge,” he added. “So tribes could sit someone out of the challenge, then Tribal served as a reset, and the next challenge they could sit the same person out again.”

He concluded, “There was no dilemma. It took us longer than we should to realize our old system was broken! In fact, I think it was a fan question on our podcast, On Fire, that made us aware! Either way, we’ve changed it and we’re back on track.”

See who went home in week two of the season.