Apex Legends Season 8 Ranked Play changes

Hamza Khalid
Fuse in Apex Legends Season 8

Respawn Entertainment has highlighted their planned changes to Ranked Play when Apex Legends Season 8 goes live, and these include increasing the Predator Rank to 750 players.

With Apex Legends Season 8 set to release on February 2, Respawn has shown off some of the new additions that will be coming to the battle royale – such as map changes and a new Legend. Now, the devs have also highlighted some other planned changes.

The game’s Ranked Play saw significant growth last year, with Season 7 having the highest player count yet, so Respawn has decided to introduce further improvements. Now, they’ve unveiled an all-new Ranked system for Apex Legends.

Fuse in Apex Legends Season 8

Apex Legends Season 8 Ranked Play changes

The developers stated that they hope to “create a healthier top end in Diamond+” when updating Season 8’s Ranked Play. Their second goal is to improve match quality, which includes filling your lobby mostly with players of the same rank.

Respawn Entertainment highlighted the following changes to Ranked Play on the EA website:

  • Earn placement RP earlier in a match
    • RP rewards begin at placement 13 instead of 10 in a match.
  • Kill/Assist count has been raised to 6
    • Earn RP for more of your kills and assists in a given match.
    • This is a slight nudge to give really good players a slightly faster trip back to their competitive rank while giving our top tier players more ways to pull ahead of the pack in the Predator ranks.
  • Assist Threshold Increased to 10 seconds
    • Earn assists for up to 10 seconds (up from 7.5 seconds) after dealing damage to a target that is killed by someone else.
  • Predator has been increased to the top 750 players
    • Allowing more players to enter Predator should improve queue times while remaining an exclusive tier for the highest levels of play.
  • Matchmaking Tightening
    • Players below Diamond will matchmake much more often within their own Ranks.
  • Skydive Trails return
    • In Season 8, Diamond Skydive Trails will be making a return as a ranked reward.
Apex Legends Season 8 Ranked play changes

Apex Season 8 Ranked Play splits

The reformed Kings Canyon will be the location of the first split in Season 8, and this will continue until March 23. After that, the second split will take place on Olympus, but there are no plans to have World’s Edge feature in Ranked Play this season.

If you were hoping to head over there then you’re out of luck, but they did confirm that we’ll see this location come into play later in the Season.

Obliterated Kings Canyon Mayhem

Apex Legends Season 7 Ranked Play results and rewards

Respawn also shared the results of Season 7 Ranked Play, along with the Season 6 breakdown:

  • 16.35% Bronze (17.76%)
  • 23.86% Silver (26.23%)
  • 32.09% Gold (36.25%)
  • 23.13% Platinum (17.75%)
  • 4.37% Diamond (1.89%)
  • 0.20% Master & Apex Predator (0.12%)

If you did well during Season 7’s Ranked mode, then you can help yourself to some exciting rewards, depending on your rank. You can take a look at all of them in the image below.

Ranked rewards in Season 7

These initially included Diamond Skydive trails, but the developers then removed those from the image. They later clarified that their inclusion in the list was an error since those will only be available as Season 8 rewards.

Respawn added a final note, stating that they plan to “keep an eye on these adjustments and the impact they have on the Ranked progression and health within the tiers.” So if there’s any update, we’ll be sure to let you know.

Apex Legends Season 8 will go live on February 2, on PS4/5, Xbox One and Series S/X, and PC on Origin and Steam.

Image Credits: Respawn Entertainment