Chicago Fire Season 11 return date: When will Episode 13 air on NBC?

Chicago Fire has been pulling out all of the stops in 2023. We had near death encounters, a lung cancer diagnosis, and most recently, the revelation that a major character (Severide) will miss a handful of upcoming episodes.

It’s an exciting time to be a Chicago Fire viewer, as you can never really tell what’s going to happen next and where it will lead. Unfortunately, we will all have to wait a while before we get the latest entry in the NBC drama.

There isn’t going to be a new episode on Wednesday, Jan. 25. The show is going on a short break, which is becoming a fairly common practice for all major networks.

When will Chicago Fire Season 11, Episode 13 air?

There are a few reasons why NBC is doing this. Firstly, the network wants to make sure there are enough episodes to fill out their weekly schedule to get to the finale in May. That is the prime time month for drama shows to wrap, so falling short of the amount needed to get there would likely hurt the ratings.

Then there’s February Sweeps. This is when Neilsen does a sizable sweep for live ratings, which means that networks will want to air as many new episodes as they can during this time to boost their numbers. It’s another common network practice.

In Fire‘s case, there may also be a third benefit. Taylor Kinney recently announced that he will be stepping away from the show to handle a personal matter, which means the episodes that were going to be focused on him will need to be retooled.

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Taking a few weeks means the writing team will have time to figure out what to do with his character and how to organically write him out of the show (for a little while, at least).

On the bright side, the wait isn’t going to be too long. The Chicago Fire Season 11, Episode 13 promo confirmed that there will be a two-week break, and that the show will return with all new episodes on Wednesday, Feb. 15. There will likely be more breaks like this to come, but at least they are all on the shorter side.

It’ll be fascinating to see whether the new episode will lay the groundwork for Severide’s exit, or make us wait to find out why he is leaving.

For the latest Chicago Fire season 11 spoilers and news, plus more on the entire series, follow the Chicago Fire category at One Chicago Center.