Azir, Orianna and Ryze get room to breathe with the Worlds patch locked, Lee Sin, Qiyana and Jinx come down, and Gluttonous Greaves and Hubris lose power on ranged champions.
Every number exactly as in Riot's official notes, organized by Hexgate so you can find your champion fast.
Your champions in patch 26.21
Hexgate's in-game builds for these champions follow 26.21, against the enemies you actually face. Get Hexgate free
None of your starred champions changed in patch 26.21.
Star the champions you play on their cards below. Next patch, Hexgate shows their changes first, right here.
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Also in this patch: ARAM: MayhemClassicArenaBugfixesSkins
More mana as he levels up.
We've kept the Emperor of the Sands’ mana pool pretty dry to make sure he needs to use soldier attacks properly for lane control early instead of just spamming [Q] Conquering Sands, but this is overly restrictive now that there are strong rank up incentives on his [W] Arise! We’re buffing his Mana Growth so he can more freely use his abilities to contest lane.
Headshots hit for less, especially with crit items, while Piltover Peacemaker gains base damage at later ranks.
PHeadshot
QPiltover PeacemakerCaitlyn’s been at a very high pick and ban rate for most players for months now despite adjustments to other marksmen and the bot meta, so it's time to nerf her. We have felt that her late-game scaling has been too strong for a while now, so we’re moving some of her power from her eyepopping full build headshots into her early game Q damage to rebalance her power curve.
Decimate comes back sooner at max rank.
QDecimateDarius has moved a bit too far away from being a persistently durable damage threat that needs to be kited to more of a one shot combo playstyle. Since he has some room for power, we’re giving him a slight boost so he can swing that axe more often in sustained fights.
Less attack damage per level and less base health.
Like her best friend Caitlyn, Jinx has been similarly dominant in the meta, even with the Hurricane nerf last patch. We’re slowing her roll to make it a tad harder to get her snowballing.
Safeguard comes back a second slower and Dragon's Rage kick and collision hit for less.
WSafeguard
ETempest
RDragon's RageLee Sin has continued to be extremely popular since his adjustments to how his [W] Safeguard cooldown works with allies. While we like the extra flexibility that has given him, it's a bit too much power, so we’re nerfing the cooldown a bit along with a minor bug fix to how his E reveal works against invisible enemies and another small nerf to his [R] Dragon's Rage damage.
Less mana growth, Ritual Nails refunds less early and more late, Ashen Pursuit hits harder, and Soul Ignition costs more but its health store now scales with AP.
QRitual NailsWSoul Ignition
EAshen PursuitLocke’s been out for long enough now that we have a better picture of where he’s overly excelling and where he’s falling a bit short. Some of those areas are his extremely generous mana tuning and ability to shrug off harass, and we’re also refining his power curve by improving his scaling damage slightly, because he falls off a bit too fast if he’s not able to close out games early.
Make It Rain hits harder and Bullet Time crits for more, scaling further with bonus crit damage.
EMake It Rain
RBullet TimeMiss Fortune has been in a relatively decent place throughout the year, but with the Hubris nerf this patch, we’re looking to compensate with a couple buffs to her damage output.
Pounce hits for less and Primal Surge gives less attack speed.
WPounce
EPrimal SurgeOur favorite huntress has been sitting at an extremely high winrate in high skill brackets, toeing the line into overpowered territory for some time now, even if she's not currently meta. Now that we’re bringing down the power of some other powerful meta junglers like Lee Sin, we’re giving Nidalee a minor nerf to prevent her from getting out of paw.
A fully charged Absolute Zero deals more damage at every rank.
RAbsolute ZeroThe boy and his yeti lost some power when we nerfed Hextech Rocketbelt earlier this year so that ranged mages weren't just buying it for a dash to safety, so we’re restoring some of that damage elsewhere.
Q and W scale more with ability power.
QCommand: Attack
WCommand: DissonanceWe’re tapping up Orianna’s scalings to help her chunk a bit harder with her bread-and-butter combo in the late game without giving too much additional power to her laning phase.
Less Q damage at every rank.
QElemental Wrath / Edge of IxtalDamage on Qiyana's Q turned out to be a lot more impactful than we anticipated, so we’re partially reverting the buff we gave her back in 26.17.
Defensive Ball Curl grants less armor and magic resist.
WDefensive Ball CurlWhile Nidalee's winrate has been borderline overpowered in the high skill levels, Rammus has been rolling over pretty much everyone else, so he’s getting a light nerf too, ok?
Overload hits Flux-marked targets harder at later ranks and gives more move speed; Rune Prison scales more with AP.
QOverload
WRune PrisonAfter the significantly early game nerfs to Ryze in 26.19, he hasn't been rewarded enough for succeeding when he does scale, so we’re buffing that.
More health per level, and his ultimate gains more damage the longer it charges.
RUnstoppable OnslaughtOur favorite unstoppable juggernaut is looking rather stoppable in recent patches. We’re giving him some buffs to his baseline durability and rewarding him when he succeeds at using his ult to GET IN THERE rather than run away.
Unraveled Earth deals more damage and scales more with AP.
EUnraveled EarthTaliyah is one of a handful of mage junglers, and we think she can be better supported for meta diversity. We’re buffing her [E] Unraveled Earth damage to make it more satisfying to land her CC combo.
Starlight's Touch, Dazzle and Cosmic Radiance now fire when cast on untargetable allies.
QStarlight’s Touch
EDazzle
RCosmic RadianceWe're smoothing out some of the rough edges in Taric’s kit to allow him to shine a bit more. Way back in the day, Taric’s W was adjusted to combat the popular Master Yi + Taric funnel strats. A consequence of this was that his spells would fizzle if they were cast at the same time that his bound ally became untargetable. We believe this harsh restriction to how his abilities function is no longer necessary given the existence of Role Quests, so we're partially reverting this change so that spells now work on untargetable allies, though we are still keeping an existing exemption on [E] Dazzle for champions that disappear on screen because the gameplay is too unclear (sorry, Master Yi).
Rapid Fire gives less attack speed at early ranks.
QRapid FireTristana’s early laning has devolved a bit into "Level 1 press [Q] and just auto attack to take complete control of the lane", which is a pretty low gameplay and off flavor way for her to succeed. We’re hitting her early [Q] attack speed so she’ll have to work a bit harder before jumping on her foes.
Destiny now reveals untargetable units.
RDestinyAlongside the Taric QoL changes, we’re giving Twisted Fate’s R the same treatment so he can reveal champs even if they’re untargetable at the time of activation.
Power moves out of Blighted Quiver and into a charged Piercing Arrow.
QPiercing Arrow
WBlighted QuiverIn this set of changes, we’re mainly looking to snipe top lane Varus, where he tends to max W, unlike the more common Q max in bot. This won't bring his [Q] Piercing Arrow back up to prior Lethality Varus levels of power, but we believe it will help a lot with our ability to tune him for bot lane. As a maxed ability, it also offers more gameplay to Varus and his opponents to interact with than some more passive damage on W.
His passive hits harder at high levels and scales more with AP, and Plasma Fission comes back a second sooner.
POrganic Deconstruction
QPlasma FissionVel’Koz has been a fairly quiet pick this year, having little presence or meta impact in mid and support. We’re looking to give him a little bit of help by rewarding him for landing his combos.
A smaller Siphon Power shield and a little less move speed.
QSiphon PowerIt’s time for the Glorious…Devolution. It seems Viktor has evolved past the point of exploitable weaknesses, so we’re opening that up a bit by making him slightly more vulnerable in early game skirmishes and across the board.
More base health regen, but his passive gives less armor per stack early.
PStone SkinLike Lee and Qiyana, Wukong has been a meta staple whirlwind of a force in the jungle for a while now. We’re looking to tap down his strength in the jungle while compensating for lane Wukong.
Q strikes scale more with bonus AD and E gives more attack speed from bonus attack speed.
QThree Talon Strike
EAudacious ChargeFollowing Sundered Sky's nerfs, we feel like Xin Zhao has room for buffs to both his AD Bruiser and AS focused builds, so we’re helping out his scalings.
Mortal Steel scales a little less with AD.
QMortal SteelThe last changes to Yone successfully got him to start considering crit in his first item purchases, but also put him at a somewhat unsustainable power level. We are giving him a moderate nerf to bring him down a bit.
Seeds recharge faster at early ranks.
WRampant GrowthLike Vel'koz, Zyra has had relatively little impact in the meta as tanks and enchanter supports have reigned supreme. We’re giving Zyra a greener thumb this patch to help her combat the forces trampling over her plants.
Less lethality and Shaped Charge damage, but Sabotage now lasts the whole game.
Bastion Breaker was buffed into being a bit of a generic stat stick in order to give it a proper swing in the meta. Now, we’re nerfing that generic power with a QoL improvement to keep it a satisfying item in its niche.
More ability power from base mana regen.
Dawncore is the enchanter capstone that isn’t, and currently only Soraka picks it up. Even when other supports get to full build, they often prefer other purchases. We’re buffing its AP value to make it less purely bound to Healing and Shielding.
Costs 100 more gold.
The greaves are overperforming for marksmen, even when getting very few stacks, so we’re hitting it with a nerf to its cost to delay early acquisitions from getting too much value.
Stronger for melee champions, weaker for ranged ones.
While Hubris has been a bit weak for melee champions, it’s clearly been overperforming for ranged users. We’re delineating between the two now to encourage melees and disincentivize ranged users from building it.
Welcome to the latest ARAM Mayhem release - “Journey to Stardom”. The stars have certainly come out to play as each game of Mayhem will now feature a Headliner performance that applies a unique twist to the rules of each game. Each iconic band will be playing their music while you battle, so make sure you enable your sound and turn up the volume! STAGE CREW ANNOUNCEMENT: It’s taking a little longer to set up the concert stages on Butcher’s Bridge and Koeshin’s Crossing, so expect those maps to be unavailable in Mayhem queues for this patch but return next patch. Along with our Headliners, we have a TON of new augments for you to enjoy. With this release we’ll also be removing some augments and wishing them a fond farewell. But who knows? Maybe they’ll be back some day for an encore. We also have a brand new progression experience where you’ll be completing missions from members K/DA, Pentakill, and other bands. Completing these missions unlocks awesome rewards like Augments, emotes, orange essence, and more! Playing games and completing missions will move you up Superstar Ranks that unlock new bands and new missions. Go from a Newbie to a Superstar performing on the Worlds stage!
While we announced that Classic will be rotating out in January, that doesn’t mean we’re done bringing back the good old days this year. This patch we’re bringing in four more ghosts from the past (or more, if you count their ultimates). We’ll also have multiple champions dropping in .22 and .23, so we’ve got a few more historic additions before everything’s all said and done. We’re also reverting all of Kassadin’s nerfs this patch, so he’s back to full 90% ban rate power. And Atma’s Impaler is back to 2%, so for all you Metagolem enjoyers, now’s your time!
Mordekaiser is back with his kit from 2010-2015! Would you like to eat every single possible minion wave, plus both your and your enemy’s Wraith camps? Mordekaiser is the champion for you. All his abilities cost health, but damaging enemies generates a shield, so you can keep fighting no matter how low you go. And when it’s time to win a fight, your ultimate can turn it into a 6v4. Beat them with their own AD Carry!
Ghostman yannik cannot compete to mojo style master yu, but he can do the babushka trick to make him double the champion and unleash omen of smell and omen of battle. If that didn’t make any sense to you, you missed out on an all-timer of a forum post. Yorick is back to his original version from 2011-2016, summoning ghouls with every ability he casts and cloning or temporarily reviving his teammates. If you want a quick jumpstart to playing Yorick to his frustratingly immovable best, consider maxing Omen of Famine and getting an early Chalice of Harmony so that you’ll never run out of mana as you constantly drain your opponents and heal while doing so.
Hecarim was released in 2012 and hasn’t changed that much over the years, only undergoing some minor mechanical updates to his Q and W. Overall, he goes fast, dives in, and has strong sustained damage while galloping alongside his foes.
Lucian is the newest champion to grace League Classic, as he was released in the back half of 2013, but we couldn’t release a bunch of Shadow Isles champions without having our old pal back to keep them in check. There are a few small differences to Lucian here compared to the one you may have played recently. Most notably, he has 550 attack range, which makes him an extremely potent laner.
Blood Well comes back faster as he levels up.
Aatrox isn’t doing so well, especially in top lane, so we’re delivering some level-scaling buffs and overall tankiness buffs to help top lane more than jungle. These are buffs from 2014 and 2015, before his first minor rework in 2017.
Less base health and regen, and her passive now stacks multiplicatively with tenacity items.
Say it with me now, “Better nerf Irelia!” Indeed, she’s come out too powerful, so we’re here to bring her down to size. We’re making her weaker by reverting some buffs from back in 2012, making her less outright durable and forcing her to rely on her high mobility and clever target selection. We’re also adjusting her passive to stack with Mercury Treads like it used to, which is a nerf whenever she builds Tenacity items.
Heavenly Wave and Spirit Bond hit harder at early ranks, with a bigger Mantra heal and more early move speed.
Karma is doing poorly, especially in support. As we want her to be viable in both of her primary roles in mid and support, we’re delivering buffs especially skewed toward her low-income role. We’re also delivering a large buff to Spirit Bond, as it can be rather hard to use on teammates.
Null Sphere hits harder and silences longer, and Riftwalk scales more with AP.
Kassadin has continued to be one of the more-banned champions but at this point, it’s clear he just isn’t his old 90% ban rate self. So we’re reverting every nerf we gave him ahead of launch. Go forth and enjoy your full power self! Make your enemies regret leaving him up!
More crit chance and more bonus AD from maximum health.
This patch we’re continuing to relive the glory days by returning peak Atma’s Impaler, as it hasn't had the same impact it historically used to.
Welcome back to another Arena patch! This time around we're making a larger set of changes with a couple of goals. We're looking to lower the power level of some of the strongest augments and increase the power of some of the weakest, as well as reduce the sharpness of some of the "one augment combos" so that the champions who're able to high roll with them require a little bit of extra juice to reach their potential. We're also looking to bring some of the champion outliers in power (both high and low) closer to the center. One of the ways we're doing that is through more non-standard changes that allow players the opportunity to use their champions in different ways, and to take advantage of different augments and items. Overall, we've shifted power in ways that we hope will change up the meta a bit and provide some fresh new build options and experiences.
QVoid Surge
REndless Banquet
QHead Rush
EChilling Scream
ECocoon
WSkittering Frenzy
RTrueshot Barrage
PDuelist's Dance
QLunge
WShield of Durand
RHero's Entrance
WRemove Scurvy
RCannon Barrage
WHyper
RGNAR!
PThe Darkin Scythe
RDeath LotusETempest
WVoid Swarm
QUltra Mega Fire Kick
RBreath Of Life
QDouble UpRBullet Time
QDark Binding
EBlack ShieldWBushwhack
RAspect of the Cougar
WBattle Roar
RHostile Takeover
WBailout
QShattered Earth
WSeismic Bastion
EToxic Shot
WPurge
EHail of Arrows
RFate Sealed
WYou and Me!
PCultivation of War
In the store from October 21, 2026. Open any skin for the full splash art and its chromas.
Also new: Prestige True Damage Know My Name Ekko, True Damage Know My Name Akali, True Damage Know My Name Qiyana / True Damage Know My Name Senna / True Damage Know My Name Yasuo, Prestige True Damage Know My Name Ekko, True Damage Know My Name Akali, True Damage Know My Name Qiyana, True Damage Know My Name Senna, True Damage Know My Name Yasuo.
Starting during Patch 26.21, replay downloads will be limited to 10 per hour. You will still be able to download your own replays, as well as replays from your friends and other players. This change is necessary to prevent large-scale abuse of downloaded replays by bad actors using vibecoded apps to scrape thousands upon thousands of replays. We opted for a time-based limit to still allow creators to make content, while preventing mass exploitative downloads. We’ll continue to monitor how many replays are downloaded to ensure players have access to this important feature while preventing clear misuse.
As a heads up, during Patch 26.22, we’ll be making changes to the Mythic Shop so that each player will start to see offerings unique to them, rather than everyone having the same selection at a given time. We're hoping this will open up the possibility in the future to allow for you to see more relevant content. In preparation for this, we’ll be making some changes during 26.21 so the rotation timings of the Bi-weekly, Weekly, and Daily sections of the Mythic Shop are better aligned. Keep a close eye on the rotation timings so you don’t miss anything.
We’ve shipped an improvement to how our patch launcher works. This improvement uses a software library that requires SSE 4.2, which results in us increasing our AMD minspec by one version. Please reference our article on minimum and recommended system requirements for more information: https://support.riotgames.com/en-us/league-of-legends/performance/minimum-and-recommended-system-requirements-league-of-legends
Riot Phroxzon previewed patch 26.21 on October 13, 2026. Everything in the Full Preview shipped except a Zaahen bugfix (he only changes in Arena this patch); Bastionbreaker ships as Bastion Breaker, and ARAM: Mayhem brings 35 new augments and the Headliners twist.
Preview reported by GameRiv and Hotspawn and AltChar on ARAM Mayhem.
Patch 26.21 went live on October 21, 2026, following Riot's patch schedule. Riot published the notes on October 20, 2026.
Patch 26.22 is scheduled for November 4, 2026, according to Riot's patch schedule.
Azir, Darius, Miss Fortune, Nunu & Willump, Orianna, Ryze, Sion, Taliyah, Vel'Koz, Xin Zhao, Zyra.
Jinx, Lee Sin, Nidalee, Qiyana, Rammus, Tristana, Viktor, Yone.
Bastion Breaker, Dawncore, Gluttonous Greaves, Hubris.
Everything in the Full Preview shipped except a Zaahen bugfix (he only changes in Arena this patch); Bastionbreaker ships as Bastion Breaker, and ARAM: Mayhem brings 35 new augments and the Headliners twist.
Hexgate shows the next item to buy against the five enemies in your game, imports runes in champion select and puts a tier on every ARAM Mayhem augment card. With Pro+, it scouts your lane opponent on the loading screen and breaks down every game after it.
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Riot's notes by Austin "Riot wroadie" Wright, Erika "Riot Cashmiir" Haas, Steven "Riot sternest" Earnest.