Attack speed
Attack speed, or AS, is a stat that determines the rate of a unit's basic attack, measured in attacks per second.
Every unit is given the following values related to attack speed by the game rules. Their amounts may vary by champion.
- The base attack speed, which is the attack rate that they start the game with.
- The growth coefficient (gained by leveling up) which is uniquely considered bonus attack speed. In contrast, all other stats gained through growth are always considered increases to the base stats.
- The ratio, which modifies all attack speed bonuses they obtain by a percentage. Having a higher ratio means that the the attack rate improves more by obtaining bonus attack speed, compared to champions who have a lower ratio.
- The windup percentage, which determines the champion's time to launch an attack (windup) as a portion of their attack speed. Optionally, they may also have a windup modifier, which alters the effectiveness of bonus attack speed specifically on the windup.
In addition to growth, champions can gain bonus attack speed from any source, such as abilities, buffs, items, runes, and others.
- Bonus attack speed
stacks additively, and each percent point acquired directly adds to the statistic (1:1).
Cap and floor[edit | edit source]
The maximum attack speed that units can have is precisely 3.003, or 1 basic attack per 0.333 seconds.
The minimum attack speed that units can have is precisely 0.2, or 1 basic attack per 5 seconds.
Some effects are allowed to modify these values. Featured Game Modes may feature a different attack speed cap; see their respective article for details.
Calculations[edit | edit source]
Attack speed growth[edit | edit source]
Excluding the outlier of
(who does not gain any attack speed growth due to her ), attack speed growth coefficients range from 0.5% to 6% in champions.The full formula for total attack speed is the same as the regular growth formula, but it includes a constant factor—the attack speed ratio—that modifies the sum of the bonus gained via growth and bonuses gained via other sources. Other than that, attack speed growth happens at the same rate as any other statistic's growth.
Short formula[edit | edit source]
Because the amount of bonus attack speed is easily known by hovering the attack speed tooltip on the champion stats panel, the growth formula can be entirely avoided with little error, resulting in a much simpler calculation.
Simple example[edit | edit source]
Suppose a unit has base attack speed and an attack speed ratio of , and it has gained 100% bonus attack speed:
- 100% = bonus attack speed
This bonus amount is then multiplied by the attack speed ratio to find the actual improvement that the unit receives to their attack speed:
Lastly, this result is added to its default (base) attack speed, resulting in a total attack speed of:
- total attack speed
At 50% bonus attack speed, the calculations would be:
- 50% = bonus attack speed
- actual improvement to their attack rate
- total attack speed
At 200% bonus attack speed, that unit would have 2.1 total attack speed.
At 10% bonus attack speed, that unit would have 0.77 total attack speed.
Generalization[edit | edit source]
Let:
- be the unit's base attack speed
- be the unit's attack speed ratio
- be the sum of all attack speed bonuses on the unit
- be the unit's total attack speed
Then the total attack speed is calculated through the equation which is a linear equation of attack speed in terms of its bonuses.
Most champions' base attack speed and attack speed ratio are equal, meaning can be replaced with , resulting in the equation or simply
Full example[edit | edit source]
- Last updated: V25.10.
As a demonstration of how the formulas work in-game, this section will use the champion statistics growth formula is used:
. Twisted Fate's base attack speed is 0.625 and his attack speed ratio is 0.651. Like most champions, he gains an amount of bonus attack speed by leveling up. His attack speed growth is 2.5%. In order to find the amount of bonus attack speed at a certain level, the- At level 10, he would have gained 2.5% × 9 × (0.7025 + 0.0175 × 9) = 19.35% bonus attack speed.
Suppose he has some other sources of bonus attack speed as well:
- His is fully ranked, granting him 50% bonus AS.
- The rune is fully stacked, granting him 18% bonus AS.
- He has equipped , granting him 25% bonus AS.
Adding all sources of bonuses together, he has 19.35% + 50% + 25% + 18% = 112.35% bonus attack speed.
In order to find his total attack speed, we then finally use the attack speed formula:
0.625 + 0.65100002288818 × 112.35 ÷ 100
≈ 1.3563985257149
- On the champion stats panel of the HUD, this number is rounded to 2 decimal places: 1.36
- In the tooltip when hovering over attack speed in the same panel, this number is rounded to 3 decimal places: 1.356.
Attack timer[edit | edit source]
Like abilities, basic attacks have an uptime when a basic attack is available, and a downtime when the basic attack is on cooldown.
Attacks follow a two-phase period called the attack timer, which consists of:
- The windup, during which an attacker executes a basic attack.
- The cooldown, during which an attacker cannot execute a basic attack.
Starting a windup also starts counting the attack timer.
- When the windup is interrupted by any means, the attack timer stops counting and resets to zero. A basic attack has not been launched and a new windup may begin whenever allowed/possible.
- When the windup completes and a basic attack has been launched, the attack timer continues on to incur its cooldown phase. All issued attack commands will be invalidated during this time.
- When the cooldown completes, the attack timer also ends, allowing a new windup to begin.
Optimizing movement commands after launching an attack is known as stutter-stepping.
Windup[edit | edit source]
A unit's attack windup is the portion of their attack which must be completed in order to launch it, different for each unit. The attacker must be standing in place in order to complete the windup.
- Upon the windup completing for non-projectile attacks, the attack simultaneously launches and hits the target.
- Upon the windup completing for projectile attacks, launching the attack creates a projectile, which follows and hits the target shortly after.
The windup and therefore the attack is canceled by issuing a different command at any point before the moment of launching. After launching the attack, commands may be freely input without penalty.
Normally, a champion's windup time scales the same as their attack's total time, proportionally to their attack speed given both bonuses and cripples. For champions that are given a windup modifier (a value different from the default 1) by the game rules, the actual duration of their windup is scaled against the expected value by that amount. Base windup time refers to the champion's windup time at level 1 and with no attack speed bonuses.
All champions are implicitly given a windup percent by the game rules, the percentage of the attack's total time that the windup takes up. There are currently two different ways of determining the windup percent — most newer champions use an independent formula while all others utilize a constant. This difference does not affect gameplay.
The original way of calculating the windup percent is where:
- attackOffset is a given positive or negative decimal value.
The updated way of calculating the windup percent is where:
- attackCastTime is a given positive decimal value in seconds
- attackTotalTime is a given positive decimal value in seconds, larger than attackCastTime
Assuming:
- All attack speed values are in decimal form.
- WindupPercent = the statistic as a decimal
- WindupModifier = the statistic as a decimal, defaults to 1
- currentAttackTotalTime = 1 ÷ total attack speed
- baseWindupTime = WindupPercent ÷ base attack speed
Then to calculate a champion's current windup time, use the following formulas:
- General form:
- baseWindupTime + WindupModifier × { currentAttackTotalTime × WindupPercent – baseWindupTime }
- If the champion's base attack speed and attack speed ratio are equal, the formula can be adjusted to:
- currentAttackTotalTime × WindupPercent × { 1 + bonus attack speed × (1 - WindupModifier) }
- If the champion has no windup modifier and their base attack speed and attack speed ratio are equal, the formula can be simplified to:
- currentAttackTotalTime × WindupPercent
or
baseWindupTime ÷ {bonus attack speed + 1}
- currentAttackTotalTime × WindupPercent
Cooldown[edit | edit source]
The attack timer's cooldown phase is simply the remaining time until their attack timer has elapsed.
Resetting the basic attack timer during the cooldown phase allows a caster to essentially bypass it and initiate a new windup earlier than usual.
Exceeding or altering the attack speed cap[edit | edit source]
The following game elements can modify the attack speed cap.
Removing the cap[edit | edit source]
Effects that remove the attack speed cap allow characters to fire basic attacks at rates higher than 3.003, given high enough attack speed bonuses. The game engine's tick rate can technically register up to 30 attacks per second, meaning one attack per frame.
is the only champion in the game that can exceed both the imposed and the technical limitation of attack speed by default.Champions[edit | edit source]
- - Increases the attack speed cap to 9999.00 at all times.
- - Increases the attack speed cap to 90.00 while active.
- - Increases the attack speed cap by the amount gained.
- ** - Increases the attack speed cap to 3.33 while active.
Runes[edit | edit source]
- - Increases the attack speed cap to 90.00 while active.
Fixed attack speed[edit | edit source]
Champions[edit | edit source]
- - 3.0; Purge does not interact with bonuses nor the attack speed stat itself, it functions completely independently and autonomously.
Reducing the cap[edit | edit source]
Champions[edit | edit source]
- - Special attack cooldown and attack speed calculation; Graves cannot technically reach the attack speed cap.
- - Jhin's attack speed does not benefit from any bonuses other than its growth; Jhin cannot reach the attack speed cap under any circumstance.
- effectively reduces his attack speed cap to 1.75 and increases his attack speed floor to 1.75 until the ability ends. Other modifiers are still allowed to alter the cap.
- reduces her attack speed cap to 1.5; attack speed from can exceed this cap by the amount gained.
Attack speed as scaling[edit | edit source]
Outside of basic attacks, attack speed can also scale various effects of certain champion abilities or item effects. A portion of their bonus or their total attack speed may be used in these cases. Certain abilities are uniquely implemented to scale down their cast time via attack speed, similarly to how a basic attack's cast time ("windup") becomes lower at higher attack speed; this time may or may not have an imposed floor on abilities.
If an ability's benefit from attack speed does not have a floor, or if that floor is lower than the one gained at the attack speed cap, any bonus attack speed acquired that exceeds the attack speed cap can continue to improve ability scalings, because the absolute total rate of attacks is irrelevant to the calculations for the related abilities.
Lastly, there are also some other abilities, not listed here, that can scale indirectly with the raw rate of attacking. For example, reduces its cooldown by a flat amount every time he attacks, therefore having a higher attack speed means attacking faster and thus reducing the ability's cooldown more times.
Champions[edit | edit source]
Bonus Attack Speed multipliers[edit | edit source]
Cast Times[edit | edit source]
- (melee cast)
- * and
- and
- and
Other effects that scale with attack speed[edit | edit source]
- (the movement speed) and (the shot damage)
- (the number of attacks), (the missile speed) and (sentry's attack speed)
- (the per-direction cooldown of the ability, the temporary bonus attack speed from is not counted) and (the number of slashes)
- growth and innate attack speed from items are considered) (the number of spins; only his attack speed
- (reload time decreases with attack speed)
- (gains bonus AD in addition to increased movement speed on-critical strike based on bonus attack speed)
- (the increased movement speed given is increased based upon bonus attack speed and the ability can be evolved based on bonus attack speed)
- (the physical damage of each dagger)
- (wolf's attack speed)
- (the percentage of the target's maximum health that Viego is healed by)
- (the cooldown of the ability)
- and (the cooldown of both abilites)
- (the cooldown of the ability and attack speed in excess of the cap is converted into bonus AD)
Items[edit | edit source]
Cast Times[edit | edit source]
Runes[edit | edit source]
Increasing attack speed[edit | edit source]
Items[edit | edit source]
This table is automatically generated based on the data from Module:ItemData/data.
Item passives[edit | edit source]
Champion abilities[edit | edit source]
Ally and/or User-targeted[edit | edit source]
User only[edit | edit source]
- and
- and
- and
- and
- with an Element
- and
Enemy only[edit | edit source]
Runes[edit | edit source]
Neutral buffs[edit | edit source]
Decreasing attack speed[edit | edit source]
- Main article: Types of Crowd Control#Cripple
Attack speed reductions stack multiplicatively and reduce the unit's total attack speed value by a percentage. The duration of these reductions are affected by
tenacity.
Champion abilities[edit | edit source]
Items[edit | edit source]
Champions with altered base attack speed at level 1[edit | edit source]
List of champions' attack speed[edit | edit source]
- Main article: List of champions' attack speed
Champion Level | Top 5 champions | Bottom 5 champions | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Level 1 | 1. | 0.85 AS | 1. | 0.475 AS |
2. | 0.8 AS | 2. | 0.61 AS | |
3. | 0.751 AS | 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. 3. |
0.625 AS | |
4. 4. 4. |
0.736 AS | 4. | 0.635 AS | |
5. | 0.721 AS | 5. 5. 5. 5. 5. 5. 5. |
0.638 AS | |
Level 18 | 1. | 1.274 AS | 1. | 0.678 AS |
2. | 1.263 AS | 2. | 0.725 AS | |
3. | 1.225 AS | 3. 3. 3. |
0.731 AS | |
4. | 1.106 AS | 4. | 0.745 AS | |
5. | 1.105 AS | 5. | 0.755 AS |
Trivia[edit | edit source]
- For most units, including champions, their base attack speed and their attack speed ratio are equal, though this is not necessary.
- The majority of champions' windup time makes up around 15–30% of their attack's total time.
- The default attack speed cap was changed from 2.5 to 3.003 in patch V25.S1.3 (Feburary 2025) for the first time since the game's release in 2009.
- The old stat icon for
attack speed was an edited red recolor of the icon of .
Last updated: August 14th, 2024 – V14.16 Without using any form of infinite stacking, the most attack speed a champion can have is 16.2885 with a level 18 .
- Base AS: 0.625 AS
- Allies:
- Enemy:
- Items:
- (masterwork)
- (full stacks)
- Runes:
- (full stacks)
Attack speed rune shard
- Buffs:
- AS Amplification:
- Relevant mathematics:
- Items = 345.33% bonus AS + + + + + =
- Runes =
10% = 108% bonus AS
+ + - Buffs = 604.96% bonus AS + + + + + + + =
total AS:
- 3.4533 + 1.08 + 6.0496)) × = 16.2885 total AS total AS = (0.625 × (1 +
Last updated: August 15th, 2024 – V14.16
The most attack speed a champion can reach at level 1 with the initial 500 is 4.7891 with .
- Base AS: 0.625 AS
- Item:
- One
- Runes:
- (no stacks)
Attack speed rune shard
- Buffs:
- AS Amplification:
- Relevant mathematics:
- Items = 10% bonus AS =
- Runes =
10% = 93% bonus AS
+ + - Buffs = 137.56% bonus AS + + + + =
total AS:
- 0.10 + 0.93 + 1.3756)) × = 4.789125 total AS total AS = (0.625 × (1 +