Hi guys, today I’m going to show you the updated tier list of the Apex characters to play in Season 21 & Season 22.
I’m a professional booster here at Immortal Boost. Knowing the best legends in every season is a part of my job, and today, I’m going to share some of that knowledge with you.
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Apex Legends season 20 has seen its largest meta shift ever and today we’re ranking where every single legend’s power lies after the introduction of the new Legend upgrade system.
Content
- Apex Legend Tier List
- D Tier
- C Tier
- B Tier
- A Tier
- S Tier
- Best Apex Characters for newbie
Apex Legends Tier List
Before moving into the details, here’s our complete updated Tier list.
| Tier | Legends |
| S Tier | Revenant, Bangalore, Horizon, Wraith, Loba, Conduit, Alter |
| A Tier | Mad Maggie, Pathfinder, Caustic, Octane, Wattson, Seer, Lifeline, Mirage, |
| B Tier | Ash, Valkyrie, Catalyst, Bloodhound, Rampart, Gibraltar |
| C Tier | Fuse, Vantage, Crypto, Newcastle |
| D Tier | Ballistic |
I’ll be starting with the D-tier Legend and then moving to the A-tier Legends at the end.
D Tier
Ballistic
There are not many legends that can be in here because it mostly depends on you, the player, and your play style. Ballistic is an odd use case as everything on paper seems pretty good, faster and more formidable fighting in the ultimate, locking players down with attack and their weapon, but in reality, all this is pretty unneeded, and you’re sacrificing support, Recon, rotational or movements benefits that the other Legends do get.
He did get some nice buffs to his third sling weapon, having attachments and the ultimate radius getting boosted all the way to 90 meters, but if you’re 90 meters away from your team then you’re probably just anchoring, or you are being a bad teammate. I do like his Legend upgrades of having the tack last three times as long on the ground or having two charges but again this doesn’t really change the game.
Ballistic has some of the worst upgrades this season, While I think he can be a fun legend to play, and sure you definitely can find some success with him. It’s hard to make the case that his abilities are just so much better than basically any of the other legends right now. His previous range was 13 meters on Ballistic buff.
Sling buff is cool, but once again most players aren’t going to utilize their sling unless they’re using his ultimate or something has gone seriously wrong with their first two weapons. Keep in mind now that digital threats can no longer go on SMGs, this is slight Nerf to Ballistics ultimate because he will not get that fully kitted alternator with a digital threat.
I do hope to see some upgrades to his perks because I think there’s a lot of room to be really creative here in the future. His small bullet upgrades can be much better, you can either have two of them or you can triple the duration for one of them. If you get hit by that then it’s going to be tough to combat it but for the most part, he’s just not strong.
Just to be clear Ballistic is going to be the only legend that I have in the D-tier. This doesn’t mean he’s absolutely trash because of these legend upgrades every Legend can find some viability in season 20.
C Tier
Fuse
Starting off in the C tier, I’ve got Fuse. Fuse’s upgrades are also sort of overwhelming and I can understand why, Apex didn’t want to buff Fuse to the point where any of his abilities did more damage to enemies. Basically, they wanted to remove some damage that the fuse could take himself. Fuse is the only legend that has abilities that center around dealing damage but I do think there are a couple of things they could have adjusted.
Instead of having Fuse’s first upgrade Be Big Bang or Scar Tissue, I think it would have been cooler if Fuse could take less damage from his knuckle cluster or decide if he wants to take less damage from his motherload.
Something like that would have brought these perks up just a little bit because ultimately if I’m playing Fuse and I’ve talked to a couple of other Fuse mains, they are always going to go with Scar tissue and then they’re always going to go with Knuckle Hustler.
Knuckle Hustler is cool because you get that speed boost if your knuckle cluster connects, so he’s definitely better than last season but he’s not a meta pick in the game.
Vantage
Vantage is the weakest Recon Legend here. For mediocre upgrades, you know you’ve got gaining access to ring consoles which I don’t think is that viable or the ultimate reload where she can get two extra bullets from an accelerant which gives her more Amun munition in her sniper but they might have given her two extra bullets.
Her second upgrade is improving the tactical double jump which you may have noticed that you can go further on this sure. Try her sharpshooter where you can refresh the tactical on hits with the ultimate. Vantage is just this odd Legend in my opinion like her abilities are decent. She’s fun to play at times but all of the other Recon Legends are just better right now.
If you’re going to play Vantage then there’s no doubt that her sniper is really strong. A couple of hits, you’re probably getting a knock, three hits you’re definitely getting a knock. It can be a very impactful thing in the fight but there’s definitely a lot of outplay that players can utilize to combat her ultimate and so when you take that into consideration it feels like the moments where she is strong are very limited.
Crypto
Crypto is the weakest Recon Legend. His upgrades are better as his first upgrade is that Crypto did receive two small buffs in season 20. You can go into the drone quicker and you can exit quicker. They didn’t release the time difference on this but to me, it felt like maybe a half a second.
The second upgrade is pretty good as you can increase the EMP range by a quarter percent or when you throw out the Dorne, crypto will call out the squads in the area. This is helpful so Crypto doesn’t have to go into the Drone and then ping the banner and if you’re not on voice coms then your teammates will have to hurt Crypto. There’s no doubt that Crypto is better but I think there’s room for his perks to go up a little when you compare them to the other Recon Legends.
Newcastle
Wrapping up the C tier, we have Newcastle. A lot of players are not going to agree with this because Newcastle can be really strong and some players swear by him. When I tried him out, I was a little overwhelmed. Upon reading his perks I thought he was going to be much better than what he is.
Increasing the mobile Shield to the weapon sprint speed can be helpful but often it felt like just a little too much was going on. If you overshoot that ping with his shield, it’s going way too far past you, and depending on how you’re moving with the shield and its utility, it can wind up kind of backfiring.
You can also choose to have the shield be stronger by an extra 250 Health points which could go a long way but there are certainly other support legends that are just better now. When you look at his second upgrade, reviving your allies with up to 75 HP which will slowly tick up over time is valid. You know you stack that with the gold knockdown that can definitely be helpful.
I think I would typically do that over his stronghold perk where his castle wall gets 250 extra HP and the barriers energized for up to 2 minutes. It would certainly depend on what type of match you’re in and your role as Newcastle. Despite her lower ranking, Newcastle will certainly still find a Niche pocket of the game where you’re like they definitely just won that fight because they have a Newcastle and that’s always been the case.
I think a better perk for him would have been to increase the revive speed. We saw how popular Newcastle was in three strikes, the huge reason was for how quickly he could res. You don’t want it that fast because that’s broken in normal game modes but if they could have done something like they did to lifelines, I think Newcastle would have been a bit better.
B Tier
Ash
Ash’s tactical got silently nerfed with the cooldown being 24 seconds but with her upgrade, she became much more viable. I actually don’t think that silent Nerf was on accident but maybe it was on purpose because of one of her second upgrades certainly, some of you could make a case that B-tier is far too generous for Ash.
When playing as Ash, having two snares was pretty good. 20 damage each time and they’re pretty easy to connect on as they can be incredibly useful mid-fights. Our first upgrades are decent and I’m not confident on which one I think is totally better than the other but they can come in handy for being aware of third parties or just nearby enemies. Combine all that with her portal and you’ve got a legend right in the middle of the bunch.
Valkyrie
Many people think that Valkyrie would return to the meta and while I’m certainly not that bullish on her at the moment. There’s no doubt a few of her upgrades are severe improvements from where she’s been at. Her first two upgrades are great. If you are playing ranked and using Valkyrie for more of the macro rotation then you should go with the afterburners perk.
Her second upgrade is really all about the full tank where she increases her fuel by 25%. I don’t really find the widening of her missile swarm that good nor worth it when comparing it to the fuel tank increase plus if you coupled aerial expert with a full tank then you’re almost back to how Valkyrie was on release where her jetpack was insanely strong.
You’re going to see Valkyrie pick rate go up but, in this season, we don’t know how high it will actually go.
Catalyst
Catalyst upgrades are mid because they really just slightly improve her to where she was at in the past but this season, they nerfed her wall in length and how long it lasts, and if you miss the exact numbers her wall lasts only for 15 seconds down for 25 and it’s now only 40 meters long as opposed to 55.
The case for Catalyst is that her abilities are still strong and while they may not be what they once were. She’s still a hybrid Legend because she can hold down buildings well and use her wall for many different kinds of scenarios and the reason that they nerfed her wall is solely because of how popular she is in competitive Apex.
In the average Lobby, her wall was problematic and some of her other abilities but I do know for a fact that her tactical was definitely way more overpowered in the past when compared to any of the other controller Legends.
Bloodhound
Bloodhound received a small but meaningful change when they made it so that the white Ravens that you could previously interact with to not only get info on squads that are near you but also to reduce your ultimate cooldown is now locked behind one of their Legend upgrades.
To be clear, you can still interact with the white Ravens and they’ll fly to the nearest squad even if you didn’t pick the ravings blessing perk but it won’t decrease the ultimate cooldown without that perk equipped.
Some people were upset by this and I can definitely see why. Their perks are pretty good and with Bangalore still being so popular I just think that Bloodhound will be played a lot this season. A lot of people thought that the second perk upgrade where Bloodhound Ham would be able to get 25 extra HP every time, they got a knock in the Beast of the Hunt.
I usually just go with the double duration of the scan and when you couple this with the first perk, Bloodhound is a great pick for ranked and for pubs this season no doubt.
Rampart
Rampart actually has some good perks and that’s a huge reason why I’m putting her here in B-tier. It amplifies a lot of her strong suits, reducing the ultimate cooldown by 30 is great, especially in early games like if you get the squad to wipe then level up your Armor, and then you know another team is near but maybe you’re low on ammo. Knowing Sheila is on the way much quicker is very strong and this perk should be then applied throughout the whole game.
Sometimes the perks can only work one time per match. It’s definitely contingent on which perk and which Legend but I would say most of the perks are reoccurring throughout the match and this is one of them.
The second upgrade is also viable because you can either get faster Sheila reloads or faster reloads to any weapon and when behind her amped cover or you can decide if you want to improve the handling and speed up time for Sheila by 20%. This can go a long way and obviously both of these stacks well with the first upgrade.
Gibraltar
Gibraltar is just much better than what he was last season. If you’re returning to Apex, well they have been slightly buffing Gibraltar over the course of last year. His perks just added some icing on the cake. Are they the best perks? No, not really but they’re decent and they improve them significantly.
The two perks I go with are a fresh start and a baby bubble which that smaller bubble that is noticeable. You can still have your whole team in that bubble, so for me, it makes the most sense because it also is going to decrease the cooldown as well. So, you got a smaller one but more often.
Gibraltar isn’t super fun bragging Legend to play like if you’re solo queuing pubs but if you’re looking to fulfill that support role in rank or pubs then you really can’t go wrong with picking him because he’s still really strong and has a high 1v1 potential.
A tier
Mad Maggie
I’m sure by now you’ve seen a lot of the hype surrounding Mad Maggie and it’s real. She has some of the best upgrades in the game for sure. Her first two updates are she can choose between a wrecking ball that catches fires and explodes in thermites or she can decide if she wants the auto reload shotguns on a knock.
Most players are going to go with the fireball upgrade because it is a bit chaotic and they have just adjusted her wrecking ball this season so that it’s a bit more consistent. People are initially a little disappointed with how it actually played out in the game. It can hit two players now without blowing up but there are some times when it’s still very unpredictable. It’s definitely improved though.
For the next two upgrades, I think it’s really up to you to decide which one you find more valuable. You can choose if you want an extra Riot drill charge but reduce the active duration by 25% or you can decide if you want the big drill which will increase the depth and width of her tactical by 50%. Maggie with a Shotgun being strong is a very viable pick in season 20.
They’ve upgraded her wrecking ball, you’ve got a better Riot drill now and with shotguns in the meta all of is just a no-brainer, so she’s definitely, an excellent Legend for pubs or for ranked especially if you want to frag out with her.
Pathfinder
Second in the A tier is Pathfinder and now Pathfinder doesn’t have the best upgrades. Most players are really excited about his second upgrade, particularly one of them. But particularly we have to talk about how Pathfinder got nerfed slightly this season. No longer you just can scan one care package and get your ultimate right back.
Now you’re going to have to scan two of them because it’s a 50% Ult charge when you scan them but in exchange, it will decrease his next ultimate on the cooldown by 15 seconds. You can also scan ring consoles and survey beacons with one of his first upgrades and this will enhance the cooldown on his zipline as well. So, it’s a slight nerf but with the perk it kind of levels out.
Most players are excited about the second perk where he can reset the grapple. This is definitely his best perk for sure because his other perk is taking 25% less damage while riding energized zip lines and this is really just his zip lines, it’s not zip lines in the game in fragment or whatever.
I don’t really see that much value in the Zipline Zen perk because back when they buffed Pathfinder about a year ago. His travel speed on ziplines is already very fast. So, most players aren’t going to take a ton of damage while riding ziplines.
Grapple cooldown, and resetting on a knock are much more OP and the only reason why I can’t put Pathfinder in S tier is the same reason as always, his hitbox is just far too big. If that was adjusted, he would definitely be one of the best Legends in the game but he’s still a very strong pick.
Caustic
I put Caustic in A tier because anytime his gas becomes more impactful, it’s really hard to ignore him in Leger meta. Players really like his upgrades, particularly his first ones. Now he can choose between having a tactical throw range increase by 75% which is huge and you’re able to Huck these traps now. He can increase his ultimate area effect by 50% and this is also viable.
His second upgrades aren’t as good but they’re still viable. You can regenerate your health while in NOX gas or you can decide if you want the NOX vision to persist for longer. This one you can decide which one you find more viable. Players typically went for Regeneration of HP but this only works obviously if you’re in the gas, you’ve taken Shield damage and you’re taking health damage and it’s a slow tick-up of health so you may find NOX vision more viable.
It’s nice to see some positive changes for Caustic because I feel like he’s been left in the dust the past year. Now that Catalyst is nerfed, I think that he and one other controller Legend are much more viable, especially if you’re looking to pick a controller Legend in ranked.
Octane
Some of you think that Octane is B-tier because of his upgrades and while I could certainly understand that point. For pubs, he’s just a lot better than he’s ever been and for controller players who want to have access to tap strafing, well this is a significant upgrade.
Now, I think taking 25% less stem is more worthwhile than his other upgrade because that means you’ll now only take 15 HP every time you stim. On his second perk, I think there’s value for both of them. You can choose to have two jump pads or have the tap strafing ability. If you play mouse and keyboard, then you’re probably going with the two-pad upgrade, but for the controller player, you’ll have some optionality.
A tier might be too high for Octane because many players don’t necessarily think of him as a meta pick for ranked but he could be in the right hands.
Wattson
Wattson does see a significant upgrade this season with her perks and the Nerfs to Catalyst. One of the main issues with Wattson in the past has been how weak her gen can be. Now her perks just enhance her ultimate that much more, well it’s hard to argue that she isn’t going to be very strong this season.
Her first upgrade is a hybrid option of having her gen spawn Arc star when it intercepts an ordinance. This only works for enemy attacks that have a 1.5-second cooldown between spawns and the arc star must be picked up before more than five can be spawned.
If you don’t want to choose that and you want to revive allies with 50 HP then this could be a nice addition seeing how Wattson has a unique revive animation. Arc star spawns can be valuable towards late game due to how much less space there is and how that always makes throwables more impactful but you’ll have to decide for yourself.
On her second upgrade, she can choose two different ways to buff her ultimate. You can have the option to have two gens out at the same time with slower shield regen capacity and also ultimate accelerants can be used twice as fast or you can choose to double the gen’s HP and shield healing capacity. The second perk depends upon the perk and overall, all solid upgrades for Wattson.
Seer
Some people are just not going to agree with this but all these Seer’s running around at the beginning of the season to complete these challenges for the flatline skin have just brought me right back to seeing how OP Seer actually is. His abilities don’t belong in the game but the constant wall hacks and info derived from all of his abilities are not good.
Most of his upgrades bring him back to what he used to be like a season or two ago. On top of all of that, there’s now a setting in the game where you can increase his ADS speed with his hands and it is found to be very useful.
If you play on lowish sense or you’re on controller then you may want to adjust this season if you’re going to play Seer. He’s one of the top Recon Legends and definitely viable for pubs and ranked.
Lifeline
A lot has changed to Lifeline in season 20. First, support bins got an overall buff which obviously affects more than just lifeline. Second, since Armor doesn’t spawn on the ground anymore, her care package has changed so that now it will spawn more healing items and smart loot things like weapon attachments for her and her squad mates.
Lifeline upgrades are awesome, you can choose to have a faster revive speed by 20% or you can just reduce her tactical cooldown by 10 seconds. Both are meaningful but I think the rapid response is better. On her next upgrade, you can decide if you want to self-revive or her next Lifeline care package is a supply drop, meaning you definitely will get a care package weapon.
Keep in mind that both of these second perks are a One-time deal per match so you only get one self-revive and you’ll get one Lifeline package that will be a supply drop. You obviously still get other Lifeline packages if you progress through the match but it will not be a supply drop.
Needless to say, all of these perks make her more viable, particularly if you’re able to speed that revive and then just provide more loot or optionality for your team as the support legend, and these perks make a lot of sense for Lifeline.
Mirage
With the changes they made to Mirage last season to decoys and now the addition of his perks, Mirage can be really a chaotic legend in season 20. You will always have decoys at your disposal now if you want to and that is enough to confuse a lot of players, especially with how audio and Apex work.
His first upgrades are very good, you can either gain an extra ultimate decoy and reduce the cooldown by 30 seconds or you can revive allies with up to a 75 HP regen. Now for me personally, I like going with the extra ultimate decoy and reducing the cooldown. This means that for the rest of the match, his ultimate will be on a 30-second cooldown.
On his second upgrade, you can either have a refresh tactical on successful bamboozles or you can gain an extra decoy charge and you can have both active at once. You can control both of them as you have to send them both out pretty quickly and then hit the control button.
If you do one at a time or if you mess up the timing just slightly, you’ll only be able to control one of them, However, it is possible to control both of them if used accordingly.
S Tier
Revenant
Revenant is the cheesiest legend but it’s hard to argue against how strong he is. His ultimate is just not good at all, it’s like a free 1v1 tool. His upgrades are honestly pretty good as his murder machine is the same as Ashe’s, so it’ll call out several squads within 150-meter range after you kill a full squad.
Just remember that this is a vocal warning and nothing will be visually indicated. If you don’t like that though you can reduce his tactical cooldown by 5 seconds and then on his second upgrades, you have a pretty tough decision to make here. You want the shadow to pounce charge time reduced by 20% meaning you’ll get a quicker tactical.
You want the shadow pounce to reset on a knock which I believe already applies when Revenant is his Ultimate. I think you can’t go wrong here with either one, it’s just going to depend on how you like to play and which one you value most. We didn’t see any Nerf to revenant but I guess Apex wants him to be at the top given how long he was down at the bottom.
Bangalore
Despite all the recent Nerfs to her, she’s still a really strong Legend. Keep in mind digital threats no longer go on SMGs and they actually removed digital threats from the wingman care package.
Now when you get the wingman, it’ll only have a 1x Sight on it, and you’re not able to take it off. Digital threats will still be able to go on other pistols and shotguns, so that is still a factor when it comes to fighting in Bangalore smoke. Her perks are pretty decent, as they’re not amazing. But she doesn’t need amazing perks because she’s already a pretty strong Legend.
On her first upgrade, I can’t see a reason why you wouldn’t want to reduce the ultimate cooldown by 60 seconds. This will significantly help throughout the match and then on her second upgrade, you can decide if you want auto-pinging on enemies who trigger her double time or if you want to regenerate her health while inside her smoke passively. This is slow and may come in handy but I think Auto-pinging is better.
Regardless, Bangalore will still be in the meta this season and I don’t see her pick rate faltering at all.
Horizon
Horizon did receive one small buff in season 20, bringing her cooldown timer up to 25 seconds which previously was 20 seconds. One of her upgrades is just reverting this Nerf all together or you can choose to reduce her ultimate cooldown by 30 seconds, which is another previous form of how her ultimate used to be.
Many players were disappointed by her upgrades as the first two upgrades are flat-out useless but at the same time, this Legend has been dominating the meta for a while. Any perks that would have enhanced her too much would have just made her that much more popular and been regression from all the Nerfs Apex has done to her over the past few years.
Wraith
Wraith just got better all around this season, so it’s hard to argue that she won’t be one of the better Legends in my opinion. Her perks allow for faster use of her queue, more info from where she’s being aimed at, and a shorter cooldown on her abilities.
When you take into account how they’ve been slightly buffing her over the past year, she’s really a Dynamic strong Legend in today’s game. You can use her for team play or solo queuing, ranked, or pubs.
Loba
Loba is another great example of just getting better all around and I believe she was already a really strong Legend. Her tactical got super buffed from her Legends upgrades. You can choose to enhance the ultimate if you want it. If you’ve been playing Apex for a while then you’ll be relieved because finally, we have some significant upgrades to her tactical that we’ve all been asking for.
It’s also worth mentioning with the change to crafting, her ability to quickly get banners for free is even more valuable on Loba in season 20. We’ll continue to see Loba picked a ton particularly in ranked.
Conduit
Conduit did receive a ton of Nerfs this season but they aren’t too big of a deal in my opinion because she already released so strong. What they did was they increased her tactical cooldown to 26 seconds, previously it was 21. The temporary Shield regeneration rate is decreased to 15 HP per second; previously, it was 20, and the temporary Shield generation time was increased to 9 seconds, which was previously 8 seconds.
They also adjusted their energy barricade as they made it not last as long and they decreased some of the HP in it. Now, these things definitely take her down a little bit, but when you look at her upgrades and factor in that, she is such a unique support Legend who can actively help throughout so many fights. It’s hard to argue that she isn’t an S-tier pick.
On her first upgrade, I am always going to go with the radiant transfer increase by tactical range by 10 meters and then on the second upgrade, I’m probably going to go with the split charge so that I can have another tactical charge but half the shield regeneration. Having two of them is very handy, you can hit both your teammates up or you can just use two within a fight.
She’s just a really Dynamic Legend and I still think her Ult is strong, so She’s S tier for now.
Alter
Alter is the 26th Legend to be added to the Apex Legends roster at the launch of Season 21. Due to her unique abilities in Apex Legends, this new character in the game is a must-pick Legend in maps like Broken Moon, World’s Edge, and Olympus. She’s a Skirmisher class Legend which highlights her confrontational and aggressive playstyle design in Apex Legends.
Alter’s Passive ability is Gift from the Rift and this ability allows her to see Deathboxes through walls, without slowing down and you can take a single item from them. Void Passage is her tactical ability that ability allows you to shoot bridging portals through various surfaces. Tactical opens a little phase breach that allows you to go through walls, ceilings, floors, and anything except mountains.
Alter’s ultimate ability is the key to where the tide of victory will turn in your favor. Using Alter’s Ultimate (Void Nexus), she or her squad can travel back at any point by putting a device down anywhere on the map. You need to have a plan for level-up upgrades if you want to know how to play Alter to the best of her abilities
Best Apex Legends Characters for beginners
Despite having such effective Legends in Apex Legends, some of the Legends are really hard to master in a short period.
Here are some of the Legends that the new beginners can easily master due to their play style.
- Lifeline
- Wraith
- Bloodhound
- Octane
- Loba
These characters are easy to play as they have amazing buffs, unique upgrades, and playstyle. If you are new to Apex Legend then it is recommended to play these characters to learn some basic tactics.
This is our final tier list for season 20 but this list will be further updated once the new season arrives.
Wrapping It Up
I hope you enjoyed my Apex Legends tier list and it will help you reach the rankings you wish for. Make sure to understand that I try to update this tier list every patch, however, unless there was a significant Nerf or buff, it’s valid for a long time.
However, if you still need help to reach your desired rank or get those badges you always wished for, check our Apex Legends boosting services and order today, I’ll be waiting.