Summary
Season 25 ofApex Legendshas begun, adding the new playable character Sparrow to the roster. While Respawn Entertainment brought numerous changes toApex Legendsin Season 25, adding a new Legend has been the most anticipated addition for many fans.
Since its surprise launch in 2019,Apex Legendshas expanded its lineup of characters, adding popular names like Revenant, Octane, Loba, and many others in subsequent seasons. However, the release cadence for new characters has slowed over the last couple of years, with the last Legend addition previously being Alter in Season 21. Fortunately, the latest seasonal update for the game has finally added a new name to the roster.
As part of the launch of Season 25,Apex Legendshas introduced Sparrow. This new playable character is the latest Recon Legend and has a suite of abilities to help him gather intel and aid his teammates in combat. Specifically, Sparrow features a Tactical that shoots Tracker Darts, allowing him to mark enemies that move in the line of sight of the trap and scan Survey Beacons from a distance. Beyond this intel-based ability, the new Legend has a Double Jump that gives him impressive mobility in fights. He can also hold more arrows for the newly reworked Bocek as part of his Passive.
In addition to these helpful abilities, Respawn equipped Sparrow with a potentially powerful Ultimate. Known as Stinger Bolt, this ability lets the Legend fire a special arrow that will damage and slow enemies within a certain distance after a momentary charge-up. While the Ultimate can be destroyed, it can take quite a few hits and provides a distraction to let players take the offensive against an opposing squad. Furthermore, the slow effect can make it difficult for enemies to retreat. Sparrow’s Level 2 and 3 upgrades impact his Ultimate and Tactical.
While a new Legend might be the highlight for many fans,Season 25 ofApex Legendsmakes other changes. According to the patch notes, the Assault and Skirmisher classes received nerfs to their Perks to help balance the character lineup. In addition, Pathfinder now has a variable cooldown on his Grappling Hook, and his Zipline Gun has been buffed. The update also makes substantial changes to various weapons, with the Devotion and Bocek getting major adjustments, among others.
The new season includes thereturn of Arenas toApex Legendsas well. This time, the game mode runs as an LTM and features a variety of differences from the original. There is also a new battle pass featuring free and paid options. It will be interesting to see the reception to Sparrow and how he and the other balance changes impact the meta in the weeks ahead.
Dev Note: We’re really pleased with Arsenals and are excited with how players have weaved them into their gameplay. These adjustments are designed to smooth out the early game by providing a little more ammo without fully replacing the need to scavenge the area and increase their relevancy in the later stages of the game.
Assault Class
Dev Notes: Assault Legends have remained popular and powerful throughout Takeover. There’s a lot of utility stacked on this class, and the scan on shield crack specifically felt like a step too far in a world where Sparrow will be bringing in a powerful scan ability.
Skirmisher Class
Dev Notes: We like rewarding Skirmishers for playing aggressively with health regen on knocks, but found the extra Tac charge had uneven results. It didn’t help some Legends and interfered with upgrades that provide extra charges for others. Ultimately, we felt that this belongs better in the upgrade tree (like Pathfinder’s new Level 3 upgrade!) rather than in the class perks.
Sparrow
Set your targets on this new Legend with our dedicated dev bloghere.
Ash
Dev Notes: We love that players are having fun with Ash and we want to tweak her balance without removing the parts of her kit that players are enjoying. Predator’s Pursuit feels redundant now that she has her new dash passive and is another form of intel-gathering that competes with Sparrow.
Dev Notes: “Remember me, friends. I may kill you.”
Dev Note: The Devotion has been feeling a tad clunky and a bit too slow in this meta, so we’ve taken a big swing at how it scales with attachments. It now continues to live up to that late game monster fantasy it’s always had. By embedding the turbocharger feature behind a fully decked out Devotion, we’ve made its loot chase more exciting and rewarding than ever.
SHOTGUN
EVA-8
Dev Note: The EVA-8 has been a particularly strong secondary weapon recently, but instead of just nerfing its damage we wanted to take this opportunity to realign with its identity as the fast auto-shotty. We’ve re-worked its damage profile into rapid fire blasts with reduced damage.
Longbow
Sentinel
Dev Note: We found the recent nerf to sniper limb damage to be a bit too punishing. Landing those long range shots should feel rewarding so we’re bumping back up the limb damage to help snipers feel more consistent and useful.
LTM: Arenas (May 6-May 23, 2025)
LTM: Arenas (May 20-Jun 24, 2025)
Bot Royale
A difficulty selector will be available to all players shortly after the release of S25, allowing players to test their skills against various levels of Apex Bots. Access and adjust this setting during the match to update the Apex Bots difficulty level.
Ranked Ladders (coming later this split)
Ranked Challenges (rolling out over this split)
Dev Notes: Tight matchmaking is still a primary focus for the team, especially in the context of Ranked. The new way in which we assign starting tier and division is a step towards stabilizing the start of each Ranked season and ensuring that higher-skilled players have extremely limited access to lower-skilled lobbies. A player’s skill and their RP value can be very misaligned and are moving more towards getting and keeping those values much closer. Work will continue to address mid and late season lobby skill-mixing.
Apex Legends
WHERE TO PLAY
Conquer with character in Apex Legends, a free-to-play* Hero shooter where legendary characters with powerful abilities team up to battle for fame & fortune on the fringes of the Frontier.Master an ever-growing roster of diverse legends, deep tactical squad play, and bold new innovations that go beyond the Battle Royale experience—all within a rugged world where anything goes. Welcome to the next evolution of Hero Shooter.This game includes optional in-game purchases of virtual currency that can be used to acquire virtual in-game items, including a random selection of virtual in-game items.
