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Apex Legends Preload 3.09/1.000.123 Pushed Out for Overclocked Season

by Alex Co May 4, 2026 6:58 pm in News

The latest major update for Apex Legends is almost upon us, and it’s for the Overclocked seasonal content!

Console players will be able to download the file now as Apex Legends preload 3.09/1.000.123, and this brings new legend, Axle, into the fray alongside with balance changes and more.

For the complete patch notes ahead of Overclocked’s availability on May 5, read on.

Apex Legends Overclocked Patch Notes Speeds Out

Deathbox Respawns

Dev note: With this new mechanic, we wanted to introduce an alternative way to get your teammates back into the fight, faster (but riskier) than the classic Respawn Beacon process, that feels like a reward for teams that successfully clear and hold an area. The safest option will remain disengaging, recovering banners, moving to a safe beacon, and respawning. But a successful Deathbox Respawn may bring your team back to full strength before a third party can capitalize on your weakened squad.

Respawn dead teammates directly from their Deathbox.
- High Risk: Respawning at a Deathbox is loud, visible to nearby enemies, and takes 7 seconds. Be sure to clear the area before attempting it.
- Respawn with Your Gear: When respawned from your Deathbox, any weapons and gear that still remain unlooted are added to your inventory automatically.
- Lockout Timer: Each additional death increases the time before teammates can use Deathbox Respawn again. Stay alive to reset the timer.

Respawn Beacon Dropship

Dev note: Respawn from Dropship is a dangerous and lengthy process. Often the surviving player activating the Respawn Beacon will get pounced on and killed before their teammates disembark the Respawn Dropship. This change is meant to get boots on the ground faster for returning players, while keeping the Dropship visible for the entire lobby for an extended duration, ensuring no enemies miss the cue that players are returning to the battlefield.

Animation timing adjusted
- Dropship arrival shortened so respawned players re-enter the game faster.
- Dropship hover time after respawn increased.

Chain Healing

Dev note: This is a Quality of Life change at its core. Many factors contribute to when and how you heal. Limited resources and timing influence this choice: often meaning that you’re going to spam heal several shield cells rather than wasting the more valuable and limited shield batteries you have. This change is meant to make that existing pattern of spamming the heal button to rip 4 cells in a row smoother and less repetitive.

While healing, another healing item may now be queued to automatically begin once the current healing action finishes.
There are 3 settings options (‘Single’ is the new default option) that can be changed via the Gameplay settings menu:
- Off: Disables the feature and leaves the current healing system unaffected.
- Single: While healing, allows the queuing of another healing item. You must queue each additional heal manually by pressing the heal button again, or selecting a new item from the healing wheel.
- Auto: While healing, allows the queuing of another healing item. Auto will continuously queue that same healing item, without any further input, until the effective health pool is full, or you run out of that healing item.

Health Bar Updates

We have overhauled the Health Bar system to increase reliability and improve Line of Sight checks when obscuring effects are present. Effects such as smoke and foliage will now more consistently block the LoS check used for Health Bars. This means Health Bars will appear less often in situations where an enemy is obscured to you.

Apex Legends Overclocked Legends Info

AXLE

Dev note: Axle was born after a big-picture assessment of the state of movement in Apex following Valkyrie’s two-year reign in the ALGS. Valk was a big pick in competitive play, and on the other side of the competitive spectrum, Octane was the perennial #1 pick. Other Legends with movement abilities have consistently been mainstays in the top five.

This comes as no surprise; fluid movement has always been a staple of Apex, a powerful tool in a BR where positioning is paramount. Our movement deep-dive preceding Axle’s development shone a light on our biggest learning: Characterizing “Movement” as a tool is far too reductive. Just look online: community-driven movement wikis and training videos are everywhere. Movement is the toolbox, and every jetpack boost, soft landing, and grapple is just one of many tools inside.

Keep your head on a swivel, because Axle transforms the battlefield into her racetrack.

Class

Skirmisher

Passive

DRIFT: Increased control while sliding.
- Axle accelerates and moves faster than others while sliding.
- She also has increased lateral control.

Tactical

NITRO GATE: Deploy a speed gate that sends users into a boosted slide.
- Stepping into a Nitro Gate forces users into a speedy slide, where they have greatly increased velocity and lateral control.
- This effect lasts for up to five seconds as long as speed isn’t naturally slowed.
- Manually stopping the slide will end the effect (although it can be maintained through quick b-hops).
- The gate is team agnostic, meaning it has the same effect on friendlies and enemies, though Axle will be the only one with increased slide control.

Ultimate

KICKSTART: Deploy an enemy-seeking drone that displaces targets on impact.
- Axle fires a drone straight out in front of her, where it traverses close to the ground in a straight line as it scans for enemies in a wide FoV.
- Once an enemy is spotted, the drone seeks towards the target, closing the gap to get within detonation range.
- If the target cannot outrun or destroy the drone before detonation, it will knockback all targets in range up into the air.
- Victims are revealed while airborne, take explosive damage, and are briefly stunned.

Upgrades

Level 2
- Super Slider: Gain a second Tactical charge.
- Automata: Gain a second Ultimate charge.
Level 3
- Jump Gate: Upgrades the Nitro Gate to give a double-jump.
  - Similar to how Octane’s Triple Jump upgrade works, this upgrades the Nitro Gate itself.
  - Players can use up to one double-jump while the Nitro Gate effect is active.
- Sliding Shooter: Bullets shot while sliding come straight from inventory instead of magazine.
  - Functionally, this allows for longer continuous firing while sliding before having to reload.
  - Bullets shot straight from inventory are capped at half the weapon’s max magazine size (i.e. if a purple mag capacity is 30 bullets, 15 bullets will get pulled from inventory before instantly transitioning to the active clip).

VANTAGE

Dev note: Vantage is currently underperforming in fights and as a result is seeing less play overall. Looking over her kit we recognized that, as a sniper, her role becomes more and more difficult the later the game goes on (and playspace shrinks). We really wanted to find ways to keep her kit powerful at every stage of the game.

Passive

Tracking a team with Spotters Lens will generate 70% of an ultimate bullet
- 10 second cooldown per team

Tactical

Vantage is immune to hard landings exiting the tac
Increased velocity from 20 Meters Per Second to 21 Meters Per Second
Increased double jump range from 4m to 7m
Reduced deceleration at final destination by ~25%
Cooldown reduced from 20s to 17s

Ultimate

Toggle fire to equip your Canted Sight: A 2x optic mounted on the side of the rifle
- While canted rechamber time is decreased from 1.2s to 1.1s
- While canted ADS time reduced from 0.5s to 0.4s
- Bullet scaling is drastically reduced in Canted sights (so be accurate!)
Increase aiming responsiveness with Normal sight
- Reduced ADS time from 0.6s to 0.5s
Increased weapon handling in both modes
- Reduced Holster and Lower time from 0.5s to 0.4s
- Reduced Deploy and Raise time from 1.5s to 1.3s
Default Normal scope magnification increased from 3x to 4x

Upgrades

Tactical Cooldown replaced with Herd Tracker: Pinging an enemy will track the entire team

CONDUIT

Dev note: As a Legend with a low pick rate that performs quite well relative to other Support Legends, Conduit presents an intriguing design conundrum: why aren’t more players picking her if her match result stats are great? Our primary goals are to keep Conduit feeling challenging but rewarding, to increase her playmaking potential, and also to provide her with more opportunities to have successful supportive interactions with her team.

Abilities

Passive:
- New Effect: If Savior’s Speed is active when sprinting toward a Skirmisher, gain an additional 5% movement speed.
Tactical:
- Split Charge has been incorporated into her base kit, granting two charges
- Decreased Regen Duration from 9s to 6s
- Decreased Regen from 20/s to 15/s
- Adjusted Cooldown to 27s
  - Standard Radiant Transfer was 32s
  - Split Charge was 21s
- Removed cooldown start delay
  - The cooldown will now always begin after casting, even if still searching for a target

Upgrades

Level 3
- Both Radiant Transfer and Split Charge have been removed
- New Upgrade: Instant Barrier
  - Gain a portion of Radiant Transfer’s Temp Shields instantly, but Regen Duration is reduced by 2s.
- New Upgrade: Enduring Barrier
  - Radiant Transfer’s Temp Shield Regeneration persists through taking damage.

ALTER

Dev note: At the highest levels of play, Alter has been a consistent performer who shakes up fights by being extremely evasive, standing above many of the other legends in her class thanks to the team utility and safety she provides. Though we feel like her playstyle drives a fun player fantasy, we want to incorporate a bit more risk into her gameplay formula, making her cunning escapes not quite as “free” as they have felt before.

Abilities

Tactical:
- Increased Cooldown from 20s to 25s
Ultimate:
- Decreased Range from 300m to 250m
- Increased Recall Time from 2s to 3s
- Increased Ally Recall Time from 3s to 4s
- Decreased Chase Portal Open Time from 6s to 4s

Upgrades

Level 3
- Void Breacher
  - Reduced movement speed from 30% to 15%

ASH

Dev note: We know player sentiment around the most recent round of Ash changes was that we “nerfed her into the ground.” We felt like we had to nerf Ash really hard to manage a relative dominance over global pick rate. But with the presence of other agile Legends like Octane, Wraith and now Axle, we have a little more wiggle room to find the happy middle ground. While we want to give Ash’s passive a little zip back, we are proceeding cautiously to avoid trending toward the state of Ash in Season 24.

Passive

Cooldown from 12s to 10s
Velocity from 425 to 450

New Mythic Universal Melee: Twin Razors

Traditional martial arts weaponry meets deadly laser weapon technology in style with the new Twin Razors Mythic Universal Melee cosmetic.

These dual melee weapons feature lethal rotating laser blades, dealing dangerous melee blows for any Legend bold enough to wield them. Twin Razors are available as a possible drop in Overclocked Seasonal Packs*, available all season long.

Apex Legends Overclocked Loot & Attachment Changes

Care Package Rotation

C.A.R. returns to the floor (details below)
LSTAR enters the Care Package (details below)

Gold Weapon Rotation

Devotion LMG, Hemlok Breach AR, Alternator SMG, Charge Rifle, Wingman

Light Ammo

Dev Note: Light ammo weapons as a whole have become a bit too reliable in both performance and sustain. Adjusting their ammo stack size is a way to take a swing at bringing the entire ammo class down a bit, while giving other ammo types some space to breathe.

Decreasing light ammo stack size to 60 (was 72).

WEAPONS

Hemlok Breach Ar

Increased Breach Charge cooldown from 15 seconds to 25 seconds
Breach Charge now disperses gas and smoke
Decreased damage from 23 to 22 (Previous Hotfix)
Decreased magazine size across all tiers by 2 (Previous Hotfix)
All Trophy Systems should now properly intercept Hemlok’s Breach Charge (Previous Hotfix)
Increased horizontal and vertical recoil (Previous Hotfix)
Increased hipfire spread (Previous Hotfix)

L-Star Emg [Care Package]

Damage increased from 19 to 20
Added Hop-Up: Redline
- Increased damage and projectile size when close to overheating

P2020

Increased base damage from 23 to 24 (Previous Hotfix)

C.A.R. [Floor Loot]

Removed Hop-Up: Galvanic Gavel
Magazine size adjustments:
- Blue magazine increased from 25 to 26
- Purple and gold magazines increased from 28 to 30

LOCKED HOP-UPS

Double Tap Trigger

Increased points to unlock from 375 to 500 on the Alternator

Turbocharger

Decreased points to unlock from 500 to 425 on the Devotion

Apex Legends Overclocked Bug Fixes

Fixed rare “SignifierName: ‘Player’ – is not expected entity type “player” for remote function” client error.
Improved interaction between Hardlight and other objects when rebuilding, preventing it from unintentionally destroying some Legend abilities.
Fixed some Low/No Ammo notifications incorrectly displaying.
Fixed Arc Star and Frag Grenade sound effects when exploded on Hardlight.
Fixed an issue with the Volt’s “Death Enhancer” skin having visible elements when the player is cloaked.
Fixed an issue where the akimbo Mozambique’s could sometimes merge and fire as a single weapon.
Fixed an issue where weapons in control could sometimes drop a level.
Fixed a crash when trying to sort random favorite skins.

LEGENDS

Newcastle
- Fixed the ultimate slam not destroying Catalyst’s reinforcements on an empty door frame.
- Added new VO for Ready to Rumble and Defensive Line upgrade
Revenant
- Fixed sometimes being able to cancel your tactical early and ready your guns sooner than intended.
Lifeline
- Fixed self revive in Wildcard sometimes not using the right animation and having inaccurate UI timings.
Vantage
- Fixed an issue where there was a slight delay before having intended ADS accuracy despite being fully zoomed into scope**
- Fixed bug where Vantage could equip weapons in fight night.
- Fixed how Spotter’s Lens gave decoys a low priority so the real Mirage is less obvious to find.
Loba:
- Fixed an issue where black market could steal banners crafted by an enemy squad.
Octane:
- Added new VO for Stim Surge.
Mad Maggie:
- Fixed Wrecking Ball sometimes failing to destroy doors when hitting them at the upper edges.
Fuse:
- Fixed Motherload not properly penetrating some Legend abilities.
Gibraltar:
- Fixed an issue where overlapping Thunder Domes would allow a player to pass into a dome unharmed.

Quality-of-Life Additions

Firing Range:
- New Firing Range Settings:
  - Infinite Healing Toggle
  - Self-Revive Toggle
  - Rebuild Hardlight Button
- Fixed thermite interactions.
- The missing Nessies have returned from their vacation.
Improved CPU performance on physics calculations, eliminating a source of stutters, especially prominent in CPUs with high single-threaded performance, like Ryzen X3D chips.
Added logic to prevent Valkyrie, or other legends, from getting inside an enemy respawn dropship.
Added Legend voice lines for when Hardlight is Reinforced.
Added Legend voicelines when cracking multiple enemy shields in rapid succession.

AUDIO

Added the ability to tweak individual voice chat volumes for each player in the squad menu.
Improved voice chat clarity.
Fixed an issue where HAVOC Rifle audio could sometimes cut out for the player firing it.

ENGINE

Graphics
- Improved occlusion data structures that were used by Olympus in the last midseason update are now used for all maps, slightly improving CPU performance.
- Fixed an issue that could lead to an occasional framerate dip when running at very high FPS on PC (e.g. 240+).
- Cleaner Ambient Occlusion, which includes new specular occlusion. This will also be faster than the previous Ambient Occlusion in most cases, except at High or Ultra settings at high resolutions (4K on PC).
- Improved accuracy of cubemap reflection intensity, especially in shadowed outdoor areas.
- Improved accuracy of sky ambient lighting.
- Improved baked lighting accuracy for many props in maps.

For the map changes, check out EA’s post about it.