The
League of Legends 26.15 Patch Notes are here. Following the
official schedule, Patch 26.15 is expected to drop on
Wednesday, July 29, 2026. The upcoming patch, arriving right after EWC and kicking off Split 3 in all regions, is relatively light overall but targets a few key champions and systems. The biggest focus is on Bel’Veth, who is being reshaped away from her dominant early-game invade pattern into a more traditional scaling carry.
Elsewhere, Riven is being monitored after rising in priority due to strong item synergies, though no major directional shift has been operated yet. Mordekaiser is getting adjustments after last patch’s ultimate changes went too far, as Riot aims to restore more tension in his 1v1 threat. Locke is considered well-balanced overall, with performance varying appropriately across skill brackets.
On the system side, Bastionbreaker is being made more accessible, Jack of All Trades is getting nerfed, and Sundered Sky is currently being targeted for its huge impact, especially as it is limiting the diversity in jungle picks.
The Full Patch 26.15 Preview. Credit: @RiotPhreak on X.
Buffs
Champions: Alistar, Kai’sa, Maokai, Volibear, Zac
System: Bastionbreaker (item), Terminus (item), Yun Tal Wildarrows (item)
Nerfs
Champions: Locke, Mordekaiser, Naafiri, Riven, Sylas
System: Jack of All Trades (rune)
Adjustments
Champions: Bel’Veth
Read more about
League of Legends changes on the X account of
Matt "Phroxzon" Leung-Harrison.
Belveth
- This patch, we're launching a set of Bel'Veth changes that are aimed at making her gameplay pattern around her early levels weaker (which is currently very high skill skewed), in order to allow her to fulfil her fantasy as a late game scaling champion
- The major changes here are making her Q at early levels function more like a regular dueling ability (4-1s CD) to still allow her to have high uptime on this skill, but also reduce just how heavily she can put certain champions behind with early invades in particular when her Q is at 1s CD
- Historically, this has caused us to repeatedly nerf her when she is particularly strong at doing this, resulting in her being balanced around this capability at a loss to many of her other more core, resonant functions
- While we acknowledge that there's a subset of Bel'Veth players who love this capability, broadly, we think it's paying too many tradeoffs for the rest of her audience
- She's also receiving a pretty significant hit to her base stats to allow power budget for some of the other areas that Bel'Veth players have had strong fantasy and resonance with
- Mainly, the major change on this patch is giving her empowered form infinite duration at level 16, which hopefully feels like a good blend of mechanics and fantasy alignment
Riven
- Since the release of Gluttonous Greaves + a lot of healing from Endless Hunger buffs and the surrounding ecosystem, she has risen to the top of the pack
- As a light fighter broadly, she's having the shape that we think is reasonably healthy, though long term, giving her more choices in the first slot other than Axiom (eg. more durable paths as well) would be broadly desirable (though she synergizes very well with the ability haste there), that would allow her to have other modes of success that aren't just one shotting her target
Mordekaiser
- Morde's ult changes from last patch were really cool
- However, they overshot in magnitude and we haven't been super happy with the ult gameplay after seeing it on live, losing a lot of the tension in whether or not he will successfully 1v1 them and also making Morde feel a lot weaker outside of his R moment
- One of the core concepts of the Juggernaut class is that they should have windowed moments of target access, but should have on average less continuous target access than other classes (eg. lower base movespeed for example)
- We think that Morde could do with more target access broadly, but through this type of windowed access, hence buffing his E
Systems
- Bastionbreaker has been a pretty niche item and is pretty expensive to deviate for a strategic output, so we're looking to make it more accessible
- Jack of All Trades nerf was also pushed to this patch; it has been a bit too strong and too present, especially for users that opt into strong defenses and are able to also supplement that with strong offense
- Sundered Sky has been strong and meta defining at the highest levels of play for quite a while now, so we're looking to take a pass at the fighter item system, now that we're out of the tournament windows
- Notably, we think it's been suppressing a bit of meta diversity, especially for things like AP jungle, or Tank JG. Part of that is intentional but the magnitude is a bit off
Alistar
- Alistar has been closer to the bottom of the pecking order for the melee support. That said, our meta adjustments to move melee supports up relative to ranged supports has been reasonably successful, so we're pretty happy with how that's played out
Locke
- Locke is still pretty strong; he has been tapering off in the lowest skill brackets and the high skill brackets, but in the "skilled" skill brackets (around Emerald/Diamond), Locke is able to both take over the game and also not throw it
- At the higher skill brackets, he can snowball but needs to play very well without throwing as he falls off sharply
- At the lower skill brackets, the executional demands and constant throws can make him fall off faster
- Overall, we feel his release has landed well
