Iced Earth took a break from touring in 2015, primarily due to Schaffer's second cervical fusion surgery. Longtime Iced Earth drummer Brent Smedley returned to the band for the current recording and touring cycle. On April 7, 2015, following a period of inactivity as a result of Schaffer requiring cervical fusion surgery, the band announced that Iced Earth would begin writing for their 12th studio album, tentatively titled The Judas Goat. In August 2016 lead guitarist Troy Seele announced his departure from the band citing family reasons. He was replaced on September 25, 2016 by Jake Dreyer. On December 6, Schaffer spoke with Fernando Bonenfant from Metal Wani and announced that the new album would be called Incorruptible, originally due in May.

On March 13, 2017, the band confirmed that they had completed work on the album for a mid-June release. On April 6, the artwork was revealed with the album being set for a June 16 release.

Regarding how Incorruptible compares to previous Iced Earth albums, guitarist and main songwriter Jon Schaffer said: "They're all kind of their own thing, but I have a very strong gut feeling about this, and so does everybody in the band, that this is one of the really special ones. So I put it up there with The Dark Saga [1996], Something Wicked This Way Comes [1998], Dystopia [2011] — it's in that league of records — so it's really gonna be something special, man. I know musicians always say that, but there is something going on here, so it's cool. We're all very excited about it." On the topic of the concept for the lyrics on Incorruptible, Schaffer said: "There is no concept on this record; it's just ten individual tracks not related to each other. Actually, on Plagues Of Babylon [2014], it was only the first six that were related to the 'Something Wicked' story; it was like a zombie apocalypse within the 'Something Wicked' framework. But this album, it's just ten individual songs. We have one called 'Clear The Way', which is about the Irish Brigade at the Battle of Fredericksburg — very tragic, actually — but that's a big epic, like ten minutes; and then we have one called 'Black Flag', which is a pirate song. It's quite a… I think I pulled it off pretty well with the lyrics, to be able to tell such a big story in a very short amount of time. I think it's gonna be a highlight of the record. And then on [the last European] tour, [we opened] the show with a new song that will be the opener on the album — it's called 'Great Heathen Army' — that's got a Viking kind of a vibe to it. So there's a lot of different things, and none of it's really related. There's one called 'Raven Wing'… I can't really think of all of them right now… 'Seven Headed Whore' — that's one that's actually pretty brutal; it's like a total kick in the balls. But, you know, there's a lot of varied emotions on this, and it's cool stuff, man."

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