Overwatch 2 is powering up once again with a new season for summer 2025.
Season 17 of OW2 is called "Powered Up!" and although there isn't a new hero this time around (the next hero will be playable in a test later this summer, though), there's plenty of other quality of life changes and updates coming to the game when the new season begins on June 24.
Here's everything new and different coming to OW2 season 17.
Table of contents
Overwatch 2 patch notes - Season 17
Season 17, Powered Up!, is all about the maps. There are new ones coming along, map voting, and some being added to the Stadium pool.
Alongside new maps, skins, and hero balance changes, we're also getting limited-time events, changes to Stadium, and more. Let's look at what's new and different in OW2's latest season.
Map voting
A long-requested addition, Map Voting, arrives in season 17 in both Quick Play and Competitive Play.
"After role queue locks, you’ll get three randomized map options to choose from," Blizzard said. "Every vote adds a 1-in-10 chance to that map's odds, and the winner is selected using a roulette style roll. To keep things chill, team chat, battle tags, and individual votes are hidden, so there’s no pressure—just a better chance at playing on maps you love. And leaver penalties kick in as soon as voting starts, so stick around and make it count."
The more votes a map has, the higher its odds of being chosen. After voting for each map, OW2 will "roll" to see which one is selected. If everyone votes for the same map, the game will automatically select it.
New maps
A new Flashpoint map joins the Core experience in Season 17. Aatlis is based in Morocco and features lush gardens to luxury resort spaces. It's a map that's "built for tighter fights, cleaner rotations, and fast-paced momentum," according to the developer.
In Stadium, Esperança and Samoa join the map pool.
New Stadium heroes
Sigma, Junkrat, and Zenyatta are the new playable heroes in Stadium for season 17, all with their own unique Powers to build ridiculous and powerful variants in the competitive game type.
Hero buffs and nerfs
Multiple heroes are getting updates this time around. Here's a breakdown of each change:
General
- Damage role passive healing reduction increased from 25% to 30%
- Base health regeneration timer increased from 5 to 6 seconds
Tank
Junker Queen
-
Commanding Shout
- Junker Queen overhealth increased from 175 to 200.
- Allied overhealth increased from 50 to 75.
- Duration for self-reduced from 5 to 4 seconds.
- Allied duration increased from 3 to 4 seconds.
- Developer Comments: Commanding Shout has been updated to provide stronger team utility and improve its overall impact. The adjustments reward well-timed use by increasing survivability for both Junker Queen and her allies. The reduced duration for Junker Queen is a double-edged
sword—she doesn’t have the speed boost for as long, but the cooldown rotation is quicker since the cooldown begins once the effect ends.
Mauga
-
Berserker Passive
- Overhealth conversion rate increased from 40% to 50%
- Developer Comments: Berserker’s overhealth conversion has been reverted to restore some of Mauga’s durability to a more balanced state following previous changes.
Ramattra
-
Nanite Repair perk
- Healing per second increased from 50 to 75.
- Developer Comments: Nanite Repair’s healing per second has been
increased to enhance its consistency and overall effectiveness during the
short duration of Ravenous Vortex.
Zarya
-
Spotter perk
- Movement speed increased from 15% to 25%.
-
Graviton Crush perk
- Damage dealt over time increased from 30% to 40% of maximum health.
- Developer Comments: Spotter and Graviton Crush receive targeted buffs to improve their effectiveness and ensure they remain viable choices alongside their counterpart perks.
Damage
Bastion
- Model and hit volume size reduced by 10%.
- Developer Comments: Bastion’s survivability is impacted by the large size
of his model despite his high health and armor pool. Reducing his model
and hit volume size by 10% improves his ability to avoid damage and overall
balance.
Echo
-
Tri-Shot
- Spread decreased from 1.4 to 1.1 degrees
- Developer Comments: Reducing the spread of Echo’s Tri-Shot improves its effectiveness at range, making it a more consistent option for a highly mobile hero.
Pharah
-
Helix Shields perk
- Shield health regeneration triggers when landing direct hits with
rockets
- Shield health regeneration triggers when landing direct hits with
- Developer Comments: Helix Shields now offer a survivability boost by triggering health regeneration upon landing direct hits with rockets, rewarding player accuracy.
Reaper
-
Hellfire Shotguns
- Damage per pellet increased from 5.4 to 5.75 (108 to 115 per volley)
- Developer Comments: Part of the reason heroes like Reaper and Tracer had their damage reduced in the past was due to the shift to the 5v5 format—solo tanking and less frequent peeling made flanking heroes more effective, along with their strong performance on certain maps and game modes like Push and Flashpoint. This is now less of a concern with the introduction of map voting and hero bans, which help limit overperformance, so we're restoring some of their damage potency.
Soldier: 76
-
Pulse Pistol
- Damage increased from 5.5 to 6
- Developer Comments: Similar to Reaper, Tracer is getting back some of the damage she lost due to past format and map concerns. Looks like she's recalled back to stronger bullets—again.
Venture
-
Smart Excavator
- Recovery time reduced from 0.7 to 0.6 seconds
- Developer Comments: This change improves Venture’s damage output by increasing fire rate, enhancing weapon consistency without increasing the lethality of their combo.
Support
Lifeweaver
-
Cleansing Grasp perk
- Life Grip cooldown reduced by 4 seconds if a debuff is cleansed
- Developer Comments: Successfully cleansing a debuff now reduces Life Grip’s cooldown, improving the usefulness of Cleansing Grasp when timed well.
Lúcio
-
Crossfade
- Base healing increased from 16 to 20 health per second
- Developer Comments: Lúcio plays a unique role within the support lineup, offering strong mobility and team utility. However, his healing output has been lagging behind other supports, especially with the increase in hero health pools. This change makes his passive healing more impactful and
better aligned with other support heroes.
Moira
-
Biotic Grasp
- Healing per second increased from 70 to 80.
- Developer Comments: We wanted to boost Moira’s overall healing output, as she doesn’t offer as much direct utility compared to other Support heroes, and we’re reducing some healing impact in this patch through the Damage role passive. We’re happy with the cadence of managing her healing
resource and swapping to damage to restore it, so we opted to adjust the direct healing rather than the resource availability or a similar mechanic.
Zenyatta
-
Duality perk
- Increased converted damage from 30% to 40%.
- Developer Comments: Duality has struggled due to the number of conditions required for activation. Increasing the converted damage improves its effectiveness when those conditions are met.
Two Mythics at launch
For the first time in OW2, two Mythics are available at the launch of a season, for D.Va and Reaper.
D.Va Mythic: Horang
- Level 1: Tiger armor and a hat with sleek, fierce white styling.
- Level 2: Bun hairstyle with upgraded visuals in a cinnabar red colorway.
- Level 3: Flex braids and a wild tiger mask in a pink-tinted colorway.
- Level 4: Hit full tiger mode with ambient spirit energy, glowing effects, and flourishes that radiate power.
Reaper Mythic weapon: Steel Death
- Level 1 Base: Brutal, sharp, soulfire-infused shotguns built for lethal precision.
- Level 2 Reactivity: Weapons flare with dark energy as you deal damage.
- Level 3 Flourish: Intricate glowing details surround your shotguns.
- Level 4 Kill FX: Finish foes with haunting swirled shadows and sound effects that embody Reaper’s fury.
Limited-time events
Season 17 has two limited-time events announced over its first month, including Powered Up (June 24 to 30) and Hacks & Hijinx (July 15 to 28), both of which include challenges and free items to earn.
Hacks & Hijinx features rotating match modifiers, from low-gravity jumps to Ultimate charge-granting health packs. Here's a complete list of every modifier you'll find:
- Mini Maxing: All heroes are 50 percent smaller and have a 30 percent health reduction.
- Lie Low: Heroes can become invisible while crouching.
- Fired Up: On Fire heroes have decreased cooldowns and deal more damage or healing at the cost of being visible to everyone.
- Charge Pack: Health packs also give Ultimate charge.
- Power Punch: Quick melee attacks knock back enemies.
- Vampiric Healing: Heroes don't passively regenerate HP. Instead, you get the Vampiric passive.
- Aerial Combat: Heroes deal and receive 50 percent more damage while airborne. There's also less gravity.
- Back in action: Respawn timers decrease.
- Berserkers: Heroes don't passively regenerate HP. Instead, for each 10 percent of total HP lost, your attack speed will increase by six percent, and cooldowns are reduced by six percent.
- Super Jump: Everyone jumps 200 percent higher.
- Motion Detection: Moving enemies within 25 meters are visible through walls. Crouching enemies stay invisible.
- Explosive: Everyone explodes on death.
- Hyper Speed: Movement speed increases by 20 percent for everyone.
- Buff Hunt: Every minute, a random hero has increased HP, deals more damage, and generates Ultimate charge faster. Defeating this hero grants you the buff.
- Damage Pack: Health packs increase damage dealt by 20 percent for 10 to 20 seconds or until death.
- Fallen Comrade: Heroes drop a globe on death that increases damage, armor, and movement speed when picked up by a teammate.
New battle pass
There are five new skins in the battle pass, along with two more in the Ultimate bundle:
- 8-Bit Sombra
- 8-Bit Genji
- 8-Bit Reinhardt
- Professor Fawkes Junkrat
- Professor de Kuiper Sigma (Ultimate Battle Pass Bundle)
- Principal Lacroix Widowmaker (Ultimate Battle Pass Bundle)
- Delinquent Cole Cassidy
G.I. Joe collab
In the road map for season 17, OW2 confirmed that G.I. Joe would be the next collab for the game. In the reveal trailer for the season, players spotted Genji in a Snake Eyes skin, and that's just the beginning. More will be revealed in the coming weeks.
New shop skins
Season 17's new shop skins include (from left to right) Lifeweaver, Mercy, Kiriko, Soldier: 76, Juno, Venture, and Reaper. More info about these skins, like pricing and release date, will arrive soon.
New hero trial
Season 17 will close out with a new trial for the latest hero, the support hero Wuyang, towards the end of the season later this summer. To view the full patch notes, visit Overwatch 2's official website.
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