Overwatch tier list - the best heroes in Season 2

April 15, 2026: We added Sierra to the list and made several changes across every tier based on the Season 2 patch notes.

Who are the best Overwatch heroes? With 51 heroes to pick from as of Season 2, knowing where to start in Blizzard's hero shooter can be pretty daunting. It's not always easy to tell how strong your chosen character is when you're constantly coming up against different counters and team comps.

Of course, just because we say a hero is a must-pick doesn't mean you can't do a better job with your preferred Overwatch characters. That said, most players should be able to look at this Overwatch tier list for a quick snapshot of who to play and why. Join us as we rank every Overwatch hero in the free PC game, from the titanic tanks to squishy supports.

First off, some housekeeping. S-tier is the highest category and represents heroes at the pinnacle of the game's meta who don't require specific team comps or strategies to dominate with. A-tier picks aren't necessarily worse than their S-tier counterparts, but they're generally harder to use and get the best out of. B, C, and D tiers follow suit, representing the lower echelons of Overwatch's roster.

While there are some similarities, it's worth pointing out that our Overwatch Stadium codes for DPS, support, and tank roles don't align perfectly with this guide. If you're interested in Stadium, our guides break down what makes each character powerful in this separate game mode.

Here is our Overwatch tier list for Season 2:

S tier

Vendetta

Vendetta is the newest melee DPS hero added to the game in Season 20. Equipped with a greatsword, she receives a movement and attack speed buff with each strike thanks to her passive ability, turning her into a spinning blade of death once you start racking up kills. Vendetta's sword can be used defensively, capable of reducing incoming fire by 75%, and most importantly, it blocks 100% of physical damage, making her very strong against certain heroes.

While Vendetta should be incredibly easy to counter due to her limited options when being attacked from range, her damage output is so strong she can usually wipe out any of the most dangerous threats with little to no effort. Vendetta's kit is so easy to use that most players understand how to pilot her within a few hours. As we predicted, Vendetta received some nerfs in Season 2, but we'll need time to see how this shakes out.

Domina

As a hitscan tank, Domina performs at her best when she's dishing out damage from range behind her large barrier array shield. Though the shield can be broken into segments, it's big enough that she can easily reposition herself to stay protected. Strong position awareness is critical with Domina as she's able to combo all of her main abilities together, but only when she can force her opponent to fight close to a wall to stun them.

Domina's ultimate ability is like a reverse Zarya bubble, stopping enemies from dealing damage and receiving healing, culminating in an explosion when the crystal bubble bursts. This can be devastating when used at the correct time, instantly putting a stop to an incoming attack. Just as we suspected, Domina has risen to the highest tier now that players have mastered her abilities.

Sojourn

It's easy to think of Sojourn as Soldier 76 but with a much higher skill ceiling. Attacking enemies with Sojourn's primary weapon charges up her railgun, giving you access to a hitscan beam capable of dealing 200 damage if you land a headshot.

Her ultimate provides constant railgun charge for a short period, and each shot can pierce, so if you're landing shots, you can wipe a team in seconds. In the November 11, 2025 patch, Sojourn received a buff that improves her Disruptor Shot, making this great character even stronger.

Winston

'Monkey one' may be one of the most common callouts in Overwatch, but Winston is much more than a common chimp. This magnificent ape is a fantastic diver who can both protect his team with his domed bubble shield and leap into the enemy backline to cause havoc. Whereas his electrifying Tesla cannon was a simple lock-on and channel in the original Overwatch, OW2 brought an alt-fire that lets him fire it like a normal weapon - he's much more useful outside of close-quarters combat now.

Zarya

Zarya has regularly maintained an excellent standing as one of the best-performing tank heroes. There was a period of time when she wasn't as popular after receiving a barrage of nerfs, but she has since returned to power.

Zarya has a high skill ceiling, rewarding players who can identify the best time to deploy her barriers. Her cannon deals a lot of damage once it's gained some charge, and used tactically alongside other ultimates, her Graviton Surge ultimate can easily swing the game in your favor by helping take out multiple enemies.

Illari

Illari has quickly become one of the go-to healers in both competitive and esports-level play. She initially fell down the ranks due to major game changes and has since struggled to be more than a middling pick. Illari has reestablished herself as one of the top support picks thanks to a rather small damage buff, featuring some of the highest win rates across all ranks.

Sigma

Whenever D.Va and Domina receive a hero ban, you can bet that you're going to face a Sigma. He poses a real threat to the majority of heroes, as you can combo his spheres and rock attack to dish out tons of damage.

Sigma excels on maps with a lot of congested areas, as it's almost impossible to miss his projectiles, and his Gravitic Flux ultimate can separate aggressive enemies from the pack, allowing your hitscan teammates to dispatch them easily. There will be times on certain maps where you may feel like you're doing nothing, though.

A tier

Emre

During Emre's initial reveal, he seemed like the most boring of the five heroes announced for Season 1 due to his shared characteristics with Soldier 76. After seeing Emre in action, it's clear he's a lot more than a Soldier 76 replacement thanks to his burst rifle's impressive damage output and lack of recoil.

While his mobility is poor using the rifle, he can switch to his sidearm to gain a speed buff. When combined with his Heat Sink major perk which buffs his pistol even further, he can gun down opponents when they get too close. He also has access to two bouncing grenades, the perfect ender to a 1v1 fight. Emre's ultimate ability essentially turns him into a stronger version of Pharah for a short period of time, and while he's vulnerable during this window, this can be mitigated with the help of his support teammates.

Jetpack Cat

Jetpack Cat's kit is unlike almost every other hero in the game, allowing her to pick up allies and transport them across the battlefield. While her movement in the air is slow, she comes equipped with boosters to fly through the sky at blistering speeds. Her ability to disrupt the enemy team by tethering them away from the action is incredibly strong, though we suspect this may get nerfed down the line.

Jetpack Cat is already disrupting meta, but only on specific maps where you can bypass traditional routes. As a pure support character, her healing is on the lower side, so if you don't have the opportunity to surprise the enemy team with a stealthy flanking maneuver, it's difficult to provide any utility to your team. She was incredibly powerful at launch, but has since been toned down after Blizzard noticed players kept banning her at the start of every match.

Tracer

Tracer is the face of Overwatch and one of the most difficult heroes to play in the game. With her paltry max health, Tracer can be wiped out quickly if you aren't careful. That said, her mobility is excellent, and she's one of the best characters in the meta right now.

On top of this, Tracer can be good for zipping in and destroying squishy heroes with one strong burst of damage. She's also one of the very few glass cannons fast enough to evade Roadhog's hook, and she's a great alternative to mobile flankers like Genji and Sombra.

Freja

Season 16 inductee Freja had a pretty rough landing, not quite living up to her ultra-mobile power fantasy, and finding herself buried by heroes like Hanzo and Ashe, who could dish out more DPS. Since the hotfix buffs to her mobility tools, she's carved out her niche as a top-tier complementary pick to dive comps.

Lúcio

Playing as Lúcio can sometimes feel like you're not helping the team all that much, but constant passive healing with well-timed ultimates makes Lúcio an asset for any team. His high mobility is great for attracting attention away from the heroes you're healing, and his soundwave - or boop - makes him lethal on maps with bottomless pits and cliffs to knock enemies from.

Keep your ultimate handy, and you can effectively cancel enemy ultimates to flip the situation completely in your favor. Timing his projectiles isn't easy, but once you get the hang of it, you can provide a lot of damage output. Pairing him with Ana can lead to some incredible speed and nano-boosted attacks, and a well-timed anti-nade on top of the sound barrier can swing team fights heavily in your favor.

Juno

Season 12's new girl, Juno, shook up the meta when she was introduced, and the nerfs she received in Season 13 didn't stop her from dominating. Juno's Mediblaster was hit by nerfs to its falloff range and overall healing, but her mobility remains untouched, ensuring her viability as one of the game's best support heroes.

Being able to heal from a distance and having the option to dart in and out of combat makes her incredibly useful, and it helps that she has one of the most busted ultimates in the game right now.

Hazard

An incredibly mobile tank, Hazard excels at diving in and out of combat and can focus on vulnerable enemy backlines with ease. Hazard has both single-target DPS abilities and his ultimate showers a huge area with spikes, damaging any enemies caught in the radius. He can also scale some walls, giving him unique angles of attack.

D.Va

With one of the most effective ultimates in the game and a rounded kit, D.Va is as strong as ever. Her mobility makes her especially effective at hunting down damage and supporting heroes, and you can do a lot of work if you can successfully breach the enemy backline as part of a dive comp.

In addition to this, D.Va's Defense Matrix directly counters many powerful abilities, including Moira's Biotic Orb, Reinhardt's Fire Strike, and Ana's Sleep Dart.

Ramattra

As the first tempo tank to debut in Blizzard's hero shooter, Ramattra's kit is versatile by design. His Omnic form is a defensive stance, providing you with access to his Void Accelerator staff and Void Barrier, which can be placed to help your team push a fixed point or retreat accordingly.

Alternatively, Ramattra's Nemesis form can be triggered to deliver an eight-second burst of aggression, imbuing him with the additional armor needed to survive a direct melee assault on the enemy team that ignores shields and barriers.

Ashe

Overwatch's 5v5 format and highly mobile heroes mean there's a lot more open space on the battlefield, and that's had a pretty noticeable effect on the potency of Ashe's dynamite, which does tons of damage in congested areas. She's a great damage pick, but you really need to land your shots to get the best out of her now that it's harder to farm for her ultimate ability with dynamite.

However, her long-range primary fire means she can apply pressure without the threat of melee heroes, and Bob is an excellent tool for routing the enemy and turning the tide of a match.

Cassidy

Like Hanzo, Cassidy is great when you're landing every shot and awful if you're having an off day. His stun grenade has been replaced with a magnetic grenade, removing his ability to deal with tanks on his own. The magnetic grenade is highly effective against other DPS heroes, capable of dealing up to 100 damage in under two seconds. Cassidy's main problem is that he has no chance of survival against certain heroes.

When Cassidy had his flashbang stun, he could compete against most heroes in the game, but now his overall damage output isn't enough to save him in dangerous situations. Cassidy's roll is no longer hindered by enemy player collision, but the focus on close-range heroes in the current meta means that this change provides limited scope to help you escape with your life.

Echo

Echo is much weaker in Overwatch as her duplicate ability now has a health point cap, preventing you from cloning a tank and steamrolling the enemy team. Despite this, she's still a highly mobile, tank-busting DPS hero with a diverse arsenal of projectiles, a beam that melts barriers, and the unique ability to duplicate an enemy with her ultimate.

Zenyatta

Zenyatta is arguably the hardest support hero to master due to his high skill ceiling, forcing players to get to grips with his strange abilities. It's worth learning his gameplay style, though, as his ultimate can single-handedly thwart any coordinated attack by providing the team with constant healing for five seconds.

Pharah

Pharah hasn't changed much at all, but her aerial mobility and damage output can still prove lethal in the right hands. She'll require a dedicated healer when coming up against hitscan damage heroes like Soldier 76, who can pluck her out of the sky.

On the rare occasion when the enemy team isn't running any hitscan heroes, you can punish them with the deadly Pharah and Mercy combo to deal devastating amounts of damage from the sky.

Symmetra

If any hero needs a revamp right now, it's Symmetra. Her kit was relatively effective in the first game as it charged off shields, but with one less tank on the battlefield, she's not as potent, which leaves her open to dives from the roster's more agile heroes. Symmetra has seen some use as part of rush comps purely due to her ability to teleport the team out onto the field at the beginning of a match, anything to get one step closer to the objective than the enemy team.

Junker Queen

Proving to be a bit too powerful as both an attacker and tank in the beta, Junker Queen's abilities were nerfed at launch to make her less of a threat. She's since received buffs to several abilities, including her passive, which now heals for the additional wound damage remaining on enemies after they die with the wound effect applied.

As the seasons have trundled on, Junker Queen has settled into a comfortable spot as a mid-high-tier hero. A safe bet for a tank main, you'll seldom suffer for playing her.

Brigitte

As a melee support with some tank potential, Brigitte offers her teammates a suite of passive buffs and protection. She can also score kills when you combo her mace attacks and shield bash, though we recommend using the latter as an escape rather than as part of a full-frontal assault.

While she's not as busted as she was back in the OG Overwatch days, Brigitte is still an incredibly versatile hero, and can keep your team topped up on health with each swing of her mace.

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