Along with maybe some minor options that all races will get access to, like eye colors, these are just the specific major features for each race that I’m speculating. Every race will get new hair options, skin colors probably, new faces, additional hair colors etc. Other races will get their unique features expanded. Some races get a sort of subrace added to them like the Trolls who get to be a full Sand Troll now.
- Race- Variant/subrace. General options. Speculation…
Confirmed
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Dwarf- Wildhammer Dwarf. Warpaint options.
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Human- Ethnic Diversity.
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Draenei- Longer tail length, and tail options. Crystal accesories.
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Troll- Sand troll. Warpaint options.
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Forsaken- Decay control (unrotted Forsaken)
Alliance Speculation
- Night Elf- Highborne distinction. (Highborne Night Elves are a class of Night Elves, not a separate race) Since the Highborne Night Elves rejoined the Night Elves as playable, with Cata even giving us more blueish features for Nelfs and introducing Mages of course with all of this, I’d see more highborne distinctions coming. Maybe we’d see arcane tattoos, hair with sort of Highborne accessories. Along with this I’d imagine we’d see Night Elves with druidic features. think of Malfurion. Wood charms and other druidic artifacts included.
- Gnome- Just whackier hairstyles and features. I don’t see leper gnomes being a focus. I just see Gnomes getting more silly hairstyles and colors along with male beard options. The females would get a lot of extra accessories as well.
- Worgen- Just extra features. More of a grim look. Possibly Worgen tails??? O.O WHAT??? HOLY SH**!!! As a dude guy I’d love to see larger beards for the worgen. Are dog collars just a meme at this point? I don’t support them but we’d all know Moonguard would faint. I personally don’t care for them but give the people what they want I guess. o.O
Horde Speculation
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Orc- Blackrock Orc. Warpaint options and Clan jewelry. Hopefully Orcs will be able to show off the different clans that still exist in our timeline; non-alt draenor. Frostwolf clan features would be cool, don’t know how… Still cool.
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Tauren- Bloodhoof Tauren. Warpaint/jewelry. It’d be nice to see more feathers and other features on the head. Maybe some charms in the back hump, something sitting on the horn that has physics with it, and other beard options. It’d be nice to see a similar feature like Highmountain have with the warpaint.
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Blood Elf- San’layn??? Real Belf beards, more accessories? I’m not sure about the san’layn, but if they did that just imagine more 80s shock/goth Belfs as compared to the Velfs who seem to have a more edgy Smurf-wizard cosplayer kind of vibe. Lets get genuine beard options as well. I hope.
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Goblin- Just extra features. I highly doubt they’d go as far as Gilgoblin. This is more of a color/feature customization overhaul rather than full on subraces. Goblins I expect to have more bolts and tools as accessories. I’d somehow imagine they’d go the way of the Gnome and add funkier and colorful hair.
You’re wondering why I didn’t put any Allied races here. Well Blizzard already confirmed that there won’t be any Allied Race customization as they just fleshed those out last expansion. A lot of people see Allied Races as just being overall cooler but honestly these features coming will be so fun to play around with. There will be just as many features for Base races as for Allied ones now. A lot of what we wish the Base had we get now. I’m hyped for Shadowlands. When Alpha drops I hope we get a glimpse at the customization. It’s all based on hope. 
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As a gnome, I hope we get some less puffy eye options for faces. I hate that basically only one face option doesn’t have deep bags under the eyes. I don’t stay up all night working my latest tinkering project, I swear! Really.
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I want a long hair style option for Pandaren without hair ties or whatever.
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Has there been any mention of whether these new options will be available at the barber, or will people have to pay for appearance changes?
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I want DK skins for pandas and allied races more than any other customization.
A white moose with white antlers and blue hair sounds amazing. A white and blue panda would make me roll one in a heartbeat.
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I’m always down for new hairstyles and colors as well… honestly, any new customization is a good customization! I’m looking forward to what Blizz has on offer for us. 
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That is wrong.
The Shen’dralar were Highborne who did not live in Zin-Azshari, and remained isolated and secluded to the point that they were never exiled from Kalimdor and did not become High/ Blood Elves . They have the same likeness as any other Night Elf.
Highborne are not high elves. Highborne are the term that identify those who have noble lineage. Highelves are the ones who became another race entirely when they were exiled and became dependent on new habits and new sources of energy.
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If this last expansion is any indication you may have to grind rep to have a weekly rng chance to get the one appearance you want.

H
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I might be wrong about some of this. As far as I know there were some Highborne Night Elves who entered back into the Night Elf Empire.
There is a Highborne Ambassador in the pre-BFA Darnassus. So is this correct?
Yes. I didn’t say this either. I said Highborne Night Elves to specify. I’ll make an edit emphasizing this point.
The Highborne Night Elves are a different culture of Night Elves. After the destruction of most of the Night Elves after the Sundering, the Night Elves basically turned into more hippies who lived in the trees. They weren’t always like that. Even the average Night Elf lived similar to how Highborne did. There is probably a cultural distinction there we can see as options but we’ll find out.
The Highborne Night elves are not High Elves. I’m not trying to say that. I apologize for coming off that way.
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That’s a good point. I hope not, but I can see it being a possibility.
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What I imply is that they have no difference in likeness to Night Elves. They used the same models even.
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The Highborne are culturally different to Night Elves. Not physically so this means more accesories and features like hairstyles that could be added. More arcane like etc.
You’re right though. They’re 100% the same race and look the same, but it is true that Highborne are generally more pale and typically always get a blue look. Think of Azshara sort of.
There is room in the lore to expand as well. Nothing is dogma and we can pray. 
2 Likes
I’m pretty sure Orcs are going to get new faces, beards, and eyebrows.
Just look at Thrall. His beard is 10000x better than any other normal Orc beard.
BOOOoooOYyyyy can you imagine if they did this? oh my god. Don’t give them any ideas, allied races are bad enough.
They’re obviously not going to do that. They’ve had bad ideas but they’re not that stupid.
That’s what I would have said a few years ago, but these days I don’t put anything past them.
I think they’d be doa if they were only available through the Blizz store, but like Nillah said, some of their decisions over the last couple years lead me to believe that it’s not completely off the table.
At the very least I just want all of the NPC skins like the red Fel Orcs from TBC, or the MU Blackrock skin color Eitrigg has. Go a step further and have the Cultist skin Humans have, the grey skin with purple face paint. You know what I am getting at here. I would absolutely love it.
Categorically:
PR blunders
Questionable game design
Story direction
Take your pick. I can expand on any one of them.