Riot made Ranks in Valorant a quite complicated competitive system. We have compiled all the essential information about the Valorant ranking system here to help you understand how you can climb in Riot's popular free-to-play first-person shooter.
Ah, Competitive Modes in Riot Games – so many of us play them, spending hours, but nobody really knows the details. So, we've put together key info about Valorant's ranked system to help you get the hang of it and boost your climb up the ranks.
This guide is split into two sections:
- The first part covers the basic stuff about how Valorant ranks work
- The second part talks about the MMR and RR systems, which Riot likes to make tricky in their games.
Let's jump right in!
Valorant: How To Unlock Competitive Mode
To unlock Competitive Mode access in Valorant, you must reach at least Profile Level 20. One Profile Level equals 5000AP (Account Points), so to access ranked play, you must reach 95000AP.
The fastest way to do this is to play Unrated or if you don't have much time Spike Rush, Swift Play, Escalation and Team Deathmatch modes (although if you are completely new to the game, we recommend Unrated; it's better for learning the basics). If you play the game for about 3 hours every day, we think you should manage to reach Profile Level 20 in about a week. Additionally, you can complete your daily and weekly missions, which you can find in the top right corner of your screen.
All Valorant Ranks
Once you unlock a Competitive Mode, you will have to play five placement matches before getting your first rank. Just like in most of the competitive games, your rank determines your current skill level. There are 22 ranks in Valorant:
How To Rank Up in Valorant
To get a higher rank from your current one, you will need to collect 100 RR points. And how do you earn RR points? Well, by winning games. You will usually get from 10 to 40 RR points for winning a match in a Competitive Mode. However, you also lose a similar amount if the game doesn't go your way.
We will go into how exactly the RR system works in Valorant later in this article, but in general, you can always see your rank progress by clicking on "Career" in the main menu.
So, to sum up – once that bar located below your rank icon fills up, you will get a higher rank. And it works the other way around; if the bar gets low, you drop a rank. It's also worth mentioning that you are always informed how many RR you got or lost right after the match.
What is a Valorant Act Rank?
Act Rank is a badge that shows the highest rank and number of wins you managed to achieve during a particular Act.
We need to mention that it does not affect your matchmaking search process; it's basically a "rank gun buddy". For example, if you manage to reach Immortal, but lost so many games that you dropped to Platinum, then you will still get queued with Platinum players. By the way, if that happened, we also feel sorry for you, pal.
Rank Decay
Valorant doesn't have a rank decay system. However, if you don't play a single game in Competitive Mode for more than 14 days, your rank won't appear in your profile. Still, after just one match, you will get it back.
Rank Reset
Your rank will reset with every Valorant Episode, which is basically once every six months. Usually, after your first ranked game in a new Episode, you will be ranked up to 3-4 ranks lower; Riot believes this is an opportunity for players to "re-prove themselves".
MMR & RR Systems in Valorant
Now that we know the absolute basics of the Competitive Mode, let's discuss how the MMR and RR systems actually work in Valorant. If you've played League of Legends before, we could say that this is the 1:1 equivalent of the LoL MMR and LP system. But for those who haven't, here's how it all works in a nutshell:
MMR in Valorant Explained
What if we told you that your rank is not such an accurate indicator of your skills? Yeah, the most significant determinant of your skill level is your MMR (Matchmaking Rating), based on your lifetime performance in Competitive Mode. And funnily enough, you cannot see your exact MMR; that value is hidden. However, if you have a rank lower than Immortal, your MMR is equal to all the other players who also have the same rank tier as you do.
And how does your MMR value affect your ranked play experience? So, this is related to the RR system.
RR in Valorant Explained
As we mentioned earlier, after each game, you get or lose RR points, right? So, the value of RR points you get after a match is assigned to your MMR.
If you have a high MMR, you'll get matched against higher-ranked enemies and the other way around with a low MMR. Also, the amount of RR you gain, depends on your performance and the rank of your enemies. The higher your Combat Score and the higher the ranks of the enemy team, the more RR you gain from the match. For this reason, it can be helpful if your duo is one rank above you rather than below you.
Difference Between MMR & RR
To put all that in simple words:
- MMR – Your "lifetime performance rank". You can't see it, but it's there. It never resets, it stays with you for life. The only way to increase it is to win games, so you better get on a hot win streak or create a new account if you're a try hard.
- RR Points – You need to collect 100 of them every time you want to rank up. The amount you get after a match is tied to your MMR, your performance and the ranks of your teammates and enemy team.
So, this is how the Ranking System in Valorant works! We hope that we helped you understand how it all works, and we've made it as straightforward as possible. Good luck in your climb, and if you ever need some high-quality players for your climb, consider joining our Discord community.