Overwatch 2 Tier List Rankings – The Best Heroes

In this tier list, we’ve got you covered with the best heroes in Overwatch 2.

We’ve updated our tier list for Season 8 and its latest balance changes.

Let’s dive in!

Here are our rankings for the best heroes in Overwatch 2:

For a visual reference of our Overwatch 2 tier list, check out our infographic below:

Note that the heroes are organized by difficulty for new players/beginners who haven’t tried them yet.

Orange represents a high/hard skill floor, Blue represents an average skill floor, and Green represents a low/easy skill floor.

Overwatch 2 Tier List Commentary

As always with our tier lists, we want to highlight that we believe that the player always matters more than the character you play as.

If you have an off-meta main that is working for you, by all means, no need to switch! Keep rocking it.

This list is more to understand if one of your characters is favorable in the current meta, or to help players that have run into a plataeu.

Quick Notes

Fundamental Differences from Overwatch 1

Since you’re here, there’s a good chance that you already know the core differences between Overwatch and Overwatch 2.

If not, know that there are some kit adjustments across the hero cast. Be sure to know what has changed for your hero pool before diving into ranked.

The other major change to know is that now, there are five players instead of six (sorry to all you sixth men and women out there). This means that there are now one tanks instead of two.

Although it depends on the comp and the map, in general, this means that there is a noticeable decrease in the amount of crowd control and shields in the game.

There will be less instances of just defaulting to deathball teamfights and more instances of skirmishes and duels that happen.

How tiers work

In S-tier, you’ll find the best heroes in Overwatch 2 which will be very present in almost all maps and comp combinations.

A-tier heroes are still great choices but tend to be present for fewer maps than S-tier characters in pro play. However, in some situations, A-tier characters might shine more than S-tier characters.

In B-tier, we’re continuing the trend of heroes that have lower overall presence and are even more specialized. Some heroes here are just worse versions or downgrades of heroes in a similar niche above them (such as Ashe usually being the better choice over Cassidy).

Lastly, we have the Situational batch of heroes in the C-tier section. These heroes are rarely seen in comparison to their peers and are usually pulled out for specific halves or holds on a very small pool of maps. If you’re having success with them, by all means, keeping playing them.

The Best Damage (DPS) Heroes

Sometimes small changes have a huge impact. Tracer’s damage per bullet going back up to 6 is a great example. Add her buff to Illari being progressively nerfed (now finally falling out of meta), and dive tanks rising in viability and you’ve got yourself the perfect storm for Tracer to retake her title as the face of Overwatch.

The break points of this buff have huge impacts for confirming eliminations on 200hp targets and players have felt a notable increase in how fast you can build Pulse Bomb.

Sojourn holds her position as the meta DPS of choice for those of you who love to click heads. Her kit is so versatile she pairs well with both tank and dive comps, and the pick potential of her right clicks outweighs all benefits of picking any of her counterpart shooting-based DPS.

Soldier: 76 for instance has fallen out of meta this season because he is easily countered by all the diver heroes this season. Sojourn also has favorable matchups playing against all the strongest tanks this season and if she finds herself facing an enemy Mauga or Rammattra, the enemy supports better be prepared for unlimited right clicks beaming at them.

Reaper is a surprise benefactor of the shifting meta in Season 8. He pairs well both with and against a Doom or Winston dive comp, as well as our newest Tank Mauga. Currently, there is no lifesteal cap so Reaper’s life steal while empowered by Mauga’s Cardiac Overdrive jumps from 35% all the way to 105%!!! Stack on the additional 30% damage reduction for the 5-second duration and Reaper can make huge plays on Mauga’s 10-second cool down.

The Best Tank Heroes

Dive Meta Returns!

Doomfist’s Ultimate, Meteor Strike, got nerfed with an 16% cost increase and buffed by gaining the ability to heal himself 75 health per second for a total of 300 health. Doomfist mains argue whether this is a net nerf or net buff, but what is clear is that Doomfist is at the strongest position he’s been in a while.

Winston’s armor damage buff gives him extra counter play potential against heroes who were previously strongest against him. Dive heroes are slowly being buffed and dive counters are slowly losing power, allowing Winston to leap and Doomfist to Slam his way to the top of the Meta.

Dive DPS and Supports to pair with these mobile tanks are also in incredibly strong positions so definitely expect to run into way more dive compositions this season!

Mauga

Mauga’s release has been ripe with hot takes and controversy! During his weekend beta arrival, he was seen as underpowered and easily counterable. Then upon his official release he was vastly overturned and complaints poured in from the Overwatch community at every level of play that he was an unkillable nuisance.

Thankfully before his Competitive release Blizzard put out a hotfix to rebalance Mauga. His current state allows him to fit nicely as situationally very strong. Muaga is especially strong against the large body tanks like Reinhardt, Roadhog, and Orisa (who still receives critical headshot damage during Fortify from Mauga’s secondary fire). Moreover, if he can maintain close positioning Mauga obliterates the strong dive tanks like Doomfist and Winston.

Overrun being on a six second cooldown and being completely invincible to all forms of crowd control allow Mauga to peel for his backline, and chase down opponents attempting to take cover. Overrun is currently the strongest non-vertical movement ability in the game and optimizing its use will prove to make or break a good Mauga player in Season 8.

Hog Rework

The devs stated in the update notes that, “Roadhog quickly became one of our top performing tanks, with a win rate somewhere around 54%.” Roadhog’s rework successfully took him from an absolute throw pick to one the most powerful tanks in the latter part of Season 7.

Mauga’s appearance has made Hog’s dream of dominance a short-lived one. Roadhog can fight against Mauga, but it is such an uphill battle, and the Roadhog 100% has to rely on natural cover or corner to mitigate as much of Mauga’s burning as possible and abuse Mauga’s slow walk speed while double-gunning. Caught off guard, the nerfed Mauga will still beat a Roadhog every time.

The Best Support Heroes

For the first time since her release, Illari has finally fallen out of S tier. Her nerfs over the last few patches had already removed her from being a “must-pick.” When compared to Ana, Kiriko, and Baptiste, her only real utility is her damage which is just a bit too low to compensate for a lack of huge fight-winning cooldown like Anti-nade, Protection Suzu, and Immortality Field.

Speaking of fight-winning cooldowns, Ana and Kiriko are noticeably stronger than the rest of the Supports this season.

The Suzu buff which doubled its healing to instant 80 health, along with the fact that anti-nade is just about the only way to reliably kill one of the meta tanks this season, makes the current support meta a cooldown management game between opposing Ana’s and Kiriko’s. Moreover, both S-tier supports are extremely versatile and can adjust their playstyle to fit every map and team composition.

Brigitte and Lúcio are also finding a lot of play time this season. Brigitte can be essential to protect her fellow Ana from enemy dive tanks, Tracer and Sombra. Lucio seems to be strongest at lower ranks, and the higher ranks, but struggles in the middle around plat through masters.

At lower ranks his AOE healing and speed boost greatly benefit teams playing close together, and in those god-tier lobbies, Lucio’s speed allows his team to overwhelm the enemy team’s lack of ability to retreat or reposition when at a disadvantage.

Want to dominate the meta for other games? Check out all our other Mobalytics tier lists.

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