Best Weapons in Apex Legends Season 31 (November 2026)

"Best weapon" lists for Apex Legends are usually one person's taste with letters attached. This one starts from the only numbers that cover every player: the weapon charts Respawn publishes in its designer's notes. The latest one, from the first week of October 2026, shows exactly which guns were winning fights going into Season 31 "Cipher" — and the Cipher patch notes of 2 November 2026 show what Respawn did about it. Our loadout picks come after the data and are labelled as opinion, because nobody has Season 31 weapon data yet.

How to read the weapon meta

Respawn's designers plot every floor weapon on two axes. Share of downs counts how many of all knockdowns in the sample a weapon got, compared with an average weapon; it rewards guns that are popular and lethal. Encounter win rate counts how often the player using that weapon won the encounter, again above or below average; it rewards guns that perform when they are used. Care Package weapons are left out because so few exist in a match.

The two numbers tell different stories. A gun in the top right is used a lot and wins — that's the meta. A gun in the top left is used a lot but loses slightly more fights than average, usually because it's the easy, common pick (the C.A.R. and R-301 sit here). A gun in the bottom right wins its fights but rarely gets knocks — snipers that finish fights but don't start many. The bottom left holds the guns that are both rare and losing, which after Season 30's nerfs includes the R-99 and RE-45.

Two cautions before you treat any of this as a tier list. The charts mix all skill levels in Ranked and Trios, so they tell you what works across the player base, not what a Predator should hold. And the positions on our map are our readings of Respawn's image, good to about two tenths of a point; Respawn doesn't publish the raw numbers.

What the data said going into Season 31

The October chart (Ranked and Trios, 1–7 October 2026) is the last one before the Cipher patch. By our reading:

Three things stand out. The Prowler is in a class of its own: about 9 points above average in downs, with a win rate about 3.3 points above average. Respawn's designer's notes say the Prowler and the Nemesis "have been climbing steadily in usage-rate and win-rate all season". The Nemesis is the only other gun high on both axes. And the two most popular automatic rifles, the C.A.R. and the R-301, get lots of knocks while their users win slightly fewer fights than average — the signature of a default pick.

At the other end, the Peacekeeper had the lowest encounter win rate of any weapon (about 6.4 points below average), with the R-99, G7 Scout and Mozambique close behind. The Longbow had the best encounter win rate of all (about 5.4 points above average) but one of the lowest shares of downs.

How Season 30 reshaped the guns

The October picture is the result of deliberate nerfs. At the start of Season 30 (Marked, 4 August 2026) EA cut the R-99 from 13 to 12 damage, the Alternator from 19 to 18 with smaller magazines, the RE-45 from 17 to 16 and the Hemlok from 22 to 21, and reworked energy ammo into regenerating stockpiles. Respawn's own "Season 30 change in share of downs" chart shows where the knocks went:

The four nerfed guns lost between 3.2 and 4.4 points each; the Prowler (+4.1) and C.A.R. (+3.8) took most of it. The designers wrote that "everything has played out as we had planned", and buffed the Triple Take, Bocek and Charge Rifle in the mid-season patch on 14 September (Charge Rifle damage at range from 99 to 110, Bocek arrow stockpile from 40 to 60).

What Season 31 changes

The Cipher patch notes (2 November 2026, live 3 November) go after the two leaders and add two new options:

EA didn't publish damage changes for the Prowler or the Nemesis — both keep their damage and lose ease of use. That's important for how you play them: the Prowler is still a close-range monster, it just punishes you more for spraying it at 40 metres. All four burst weapons (Prowler, Hemlok Burst, Nemesis and Akimbo Wingman) also get tap-fire queuing, so a trigger press during a burst fires the next one as soon as it can. Our recoil control guide shows how to handle the extra kick.

The Akimbo Wingman, explained

The Akimbo Wingman is the season's headline weapon and the first new akimbo gun since Season 22, according to the designer's notes. It changes the plain Wingman too, so read this even if you never pick up two:

• The Wingman is now a Heavy-ammo pistol. It moved from Sniper to Heavy ammo, uses Heavy magazines and spawns at Heavy Ammo Arsenals. Base damage dropped from 50 to 45.
• Two Wingmen = Akimbo, automatically. Looting a second Wingman puts you into Akimbo mode.
• In Akimbo mode the magazine doubles and the fire rate rises slightly, but the headshot multiplier falls to 1.25x (56 per headshot), and reload time and recoil go up.
• It fires in bursts. The two guns fire alternately in quick bursts, and holding the trigger keeps releasing bursts.

Respawn's stated aim was to keep the Wingman's "high skill floor" and mid-range poke while making it less intimidating. In our view that makes the single Wingman a solid Heavy-ammo sidearm next to an SMG, and Akimbo a close-to-mid option for players who already hit their Wingman shots — the doubled magazine forgives misses, the 1.25x headshots don't reward flicks as much as before.

Our picks for Season 31 (opinion, dated)

This is BoostPirate's view on 8 November 2026, built on the data and the changes above. It assumes ranked or trios, where most fights start at mid range and finish close:

What we'd skip for now: building around the Nemesis if you struggle with its recoil (the extra vertical kick hurts exactly that player), and the R-99 and RE-45, which sat bottom left after their Season 30 nerfs. If your legend plays close, the Assault legends guide pairs these loadouts with legends; the Season 31 ranked picks cover the legend side.

Care Package and Stronghold weapons

Care Package weapons rotate every season. The last six rotations, from EA's season patch notes:

So in Season 31 the Akimbo Mozambique joins the 30-30 Repeater (which entered in Season 30 and isn't moved by the Cipher notes). The Akimbo Mozambique deals 18 per pellet, has a tighter blast and carries the Executioner hop-up, which heals 15 shields a second; its stockpile is 80 shots (40 per gun). Two Care Packages drop while Round 1 closes and one more while Round 2 closes.

The new Stronghold is the other way to get a Care Package weapon. One drops per match while Round 2 closes; once a team captures it, it opens to one Care Package weapon, three gold guns, three amps and two Corrupted Attachments. Gold guns carry the Accelerator hop-up when they have no other, so damage with them earns 30% more EVO. The Ring guide covers when it lands and how to contest it.

Energy weapons after the ammo rework

Since Season 30 there are no Energy ammo boxes. Energy weapons carry a stockpile that refills one magazine every 18 seconds while you aren't firing or reloading, so an energy gun is never empty for long — but it can't be topped up from the floor either.

The stockpile grows with the magazine: a bare Volt holds 40 shots, a Volt with a purple magazine 54. In our experience that makes an energy gun the best second weapon for a long fight, because it reloads itself while you shoot the other one. In Season 31 the L-STAR returns from the Care Package with a smaller stockpile (88) and overheats after 22 shots.

Loadout mistakes we see every day

When this page changes

Respawn usually publishes weapon charts with each season's and mid-season's designer's notes. We'll redraw the map when Season 31 data appears and after each balance patch; the date at the top of this page shows the last check. For the rest of the loot side, read attachments and crafting and armor and EVO.