How Ranked Works in Valorant

Released during the height of the pandemic in 2020, Valorant has taken gaming by storm and become a juggernaut in the FPS market. The game is a blast to play and we’ve seen many creative ways to enjoy its roster of agents.

Like all first-person shooter games, Valorant has the benefit of containing a ranked system. This way, players can test their skills compared to other players from around the world. Because of this, Valorant ranks are some of the most fun ways to learn the game, get better and interact with a diverse group of players.

If you’re thinking of hopping into the FPS game, there are a few things you’ll need to learn. In this guide, we will be answering your burning question on “how does Valorant Ranked work?” Through the contents of our guide, you’ll learn how your MMR affects matchmaking, the Valorant Rank Distribution tiers, and the leaderboards. By the end of it, you should have a solid grasp of Valorant ranks.

What are the ranks in Valorant?

The Valorant rank distribution system is something that is entirely based on what is considered the standard in most video games today. Even Riot Games’ other multiplayer title, League of Legends uses a similar ranked distribution system.

Essentially, you’ve got ranks spanning different tiers. Each tier within a rank matches you up with players that are closest to your skill level. This way, you can gauge your proficiency and discover whether or not you’re up to the standard in the game.

How will the game figure out your tier? That’s an interesting question because the answer is a solution that is very complicated. Luckily, we’ve got you covered with an easy explanation. The MMR (Match Making Rating) is a way for Valorant ranks to be distributed according to your performance history. We will further explain the MMR system later on in this guide, so stick around to get the fine details on how that system works.

• Iron
• Bronze
• Silver
• Gold
• Platinum
• Diamond
• Immortal
• Radiant (previously named Valorant)
•  

From Iron to Immortal, players will have 3 tiers to climb through. Starting from tier one as the lowest and tier three as the highest tier. In order to climb, you’ll need to get to tier 3 and win games before being promoted to a new rank.

If we are not counting Unranked, there are a total of 22 ranks within the Valorant rank distribution system. Climbing to the top of the leaderboard is something that will require a lot of effort from players to achieve.

If you do get to the highest point of the Valorant ranks, you’ll get to be Radiant which is reserved for the top 500 players in a region. Additionally, the top 1% in a region are the most likely to achieve Immortal.

It is certainly a huge road ahead if you’re looking to become one of the best Valorant players in the world.

How you can progress in Valorant ranked games

Unlike video games in the past, climbing through Valorant ranks is something that mainly requires skill, rather than an arbitrary number of hours spent grinding. Choosing to queue up strategically and according to your biggest strengths will see you rising through the competitive ladder faster than players who simply queue up blindly.

The ranking system used in Valorant is one that is mainly dependent on your number of wins or losses as a team. Your individual performance also plays a role, but it is much smaller compared to the strength of your team performance.

At higher ranks, that changes a lot, and suddenly once you hit Immortal and above, Riot Games begins to prioritize your individual performance as a metric for success in Valorant.

Riot Games states their reason for this being that it trusts you and your teammates have earned your way to the top of Valorant. Your MMR and other hidden stats are the highest among all the players in the world, so there’s no doubt that you have the skills and maturity to maintain a high level of play.

How premade teams work in Valorant ranked

In Valorant, you can queue up with teammates in parties of five people in order to play ranked games. This is a big difference from other Riot Games titles that required you to play within a limit of up to two players for the main ranked queue. However, it is designed in a way that still remains fair to players that are not able to 5-stack a match.

Now, while you may have a good understanding of the leaderboard, it’s time to give a detailed explanation of “how does Valorant ranked work for premade teams?”

Five stacks can play together regardless of their ranks. However, they will earn fewer rank rating points for playing together as a premade team of 5. Previously, this wasn’t the case and 5-man premade teams were only allowed to queue up together if they were within the same rank (three-tier difference). This was changed in patch 3.10 and now things are much better.

Here is a more detailed rundown of things to get you up to speed if you ever need to refer to this guide:

If your entire group is Diamond 2 or below:

If you’re planning on jumping into ranked with your friends and you meet this criteria, you’ll probably experience some very long queue times as the game will only match you with other 5-stack players that have a similar MMR.

Your Rank Rating is also going to be different as your wins and losses will be different compared to playing alone. If your group has a large ranked disparity, that will determine the amount of RR you’ll get.

If you have at least one member that is Diamond 3 or higher:

Similar to the above, you’ll get longer queue times and only be matched with players on your MMR levels in a five stack.

There is also going to be a 50-90% ranked rating reduction for meeting this criteria depending on the skill gap between your members.

If you have at least one member that is Radiant:

You’ll probably experience the longest queue times of all the criteria here.

Additionally, you’ll get a 75% reduction on your ranked ratings.

Lastly, playing with a player below Radiant reduces your potential ranked rating changes by 90%.

Thanks to all these features related to 5-stacks, Valorant does not allow four-stacks in order to avoid people being toxic towards players in solo queue.

How to start playing ranked in Valorant

Now that you’ve got a good answer to the question, “how does Valorant ranked work?” it’s time to figure out the best practices for getting started.

Diving straight into ranked mode is a brave plunge as the world of ranked is quite different from unranked. This new world is one that is completely littered with all kinds of players. As the stakes are higher, so are the personalities. Everyone is amplified on their objectives, so you’ll need a strong sense of dedication and confidence to traverse the things you’ll see while playing.

If you’ve ever encountered trolls while in unranked matches, you can expect them to be a bit less, but once you encounter them, you’ll definitely have to calm yourself down and avoid getting tilted at the events of bad teammates and incompetent gameplay strategies.

You’ll first get access to the ranked competitive mode once you reach level 20. At this point, you would have had a bit of experience with a few agents, learning the maps, guns, and abilities. You might even have a few mechanical tricks up your sleeve at this point.

If such is the case, then it’s time to jump in.

What are Act Ranks in Valorant

Like the ranks we explained above, Act Ranks are a way to display your ranked history in Valorant. Unlike typical video games, Valorant ranks are not divided into seasons but rather, Acts. 

An Act is the equivalent of a season but it is slightly more complicated. Every Act is part of an episode. There are three acts per episode, so an episode is a 6-month-long system that separates full-fledged updates to Valorant. Each Act also has its fair share of substantial updates with new Agents and other features, but an Act is something that is equivalent to a season.

Now, as for those confusing-looking triangles on the Act Rank screen, here’s an outline to understand it better. When you play a match in an Act, your Act Rank badge gets filled with a new triangle representing the rank (not tier) you played that game in. Therefore, if you played 9 games in gold, you’ll get 9 gold triangles within the larger triangle.

The triangle is also able to change its borders to become more detailed according to the more wins you have in an Act. This way, players with a penchant for dominating the leaderboard will get a pretty nice-looking triangle by the end of an Act.

Conclusion

There you have it, a detailed explanation to answer the question, “how does Valorant Ranked work?”. You can also check out our detailed guide on how MMR works in Valorant if you’re looking to learn more about the math behind the systems used by Riot games.