League of Legends runes information for newcomers in 2026

League of Legends has complexity that extends past its mechanical talent. There are merchandise builds, champion picks, and staff comps to keep in mind, however LoL runes play an necessary position in a successful staff, typically earlier than you even land in Summoner’s Rift.

The Runes in League of Legends supply important passive enhancements that may add new talents or buffs to a champion, shaping the best way a match can be performed, from bettering maintain to stacking burst injury. These runes can be utilized to amplify your champion’s energy or paper over their weaknesses, shaping them for a selected playstyle, however what do every of the LoL runes do?

Our League of Legends runes information for 2026 will break down all the pieces you should learn about LoL runes and tips on how to use them. 

League of Legends runes basically act as customisable loadouts gamers select earlier than a match begins, versus objects, which form a playstyle throughout a match. Runes improve a champion’s stats, talents, and method. The simplest approach to consider them is as passive perks that offer you an edge and tailor a champion to the way you wish to play.

There are 5 most important rune paths: 

These rune paths embrace a keystone rune, essentially the most highly effective perk, together with a bunch of minor runes that offer you smaller bonuses. Earlier than the sport begins, you select one major and secondary path, in addition to stat shards to additional refine your construct.

Briefly, Runes form how your champion performs, and constructing the best rune web page is vital to successful matchups and scaling successfully.

Rune paths in LoL are designed to assist particular playstyles, enhancing a selected champion’s energy. Every path consists of keystone runes and three slots (major, secondary, and tertiary). Right here is the breakdown of the 5 main LoL rune paths.

The Precision rune path is usually favoured by ADCs or champions within the fighter class who revolve round sustained injury and persistently buying and selling. This path improves assault pace, auto-attack injury output, and survivability throughout longer fights.

The Domination rune path is for many who are searching for burst injury and aggression, often fitted to mages and assassins, sometimes in Mid or the Jungle. These runes are perfect for these eager to safe kills rapidly and roam the map.

These selecting the Sorcery rune path choose it for its enhancements to a champion’s poke, burst injury, or scale with their potential energy stat. Because of this, it’s the pure selection for mages, together with helps and poke-heavy champions.

These searching for sturdiness, crowd management, and improved resistances want look no additional than the Resolve rune path. It sometimes works for tanks, bruisers, and helps trying to endure fights and defend allies.

Because the Inspiration rune path’s title implies, it revolves round being artistic and rule-bending. It offers gamers with further utility, bonuses, and extra maintain, corresponding to mana.

Right here’s a step-by-step breakdown on tips on how to construct rune pages in LoL and discover the right rune setup for any position. 

Beginning on the most important display screen, navigate to the “runes” part of your account’s assortment and click on on “Create New”. You can too create a brand new rune web page by the champion choice menu when within the draft.

All gamers will get three free rune pages. Should you want extra, you should purchase them for 590 RP (Riot Factors) or 6,300 Blue Essence. Gamers can concurrently have a most of 25 customized rune pages, separate from the preset default rune pages out there. 

A major rune path ought to match a champion’s core playstyle. Take into consideration what runes will improve your chosen champion most: 

Every rune path gives three distinctive keystones. That is your most necessary rune and often defines your early and mid-game energy spikes exterior of things. For instance, in Sorcery there may be: 

Select the rune that greatest matches your supposed playstyle. 

Now, choose a secondary path that enhances your major one. This lets you choose three further runes from that major path. These can supply further buffs and stats, starting from potential haste, assault pace, therapeutic, or armour penetration.

The following step is to decide on a secondary path that enhances your major one. This lets you choose two extra minor runes from a special path. For instance, many assist gamers pair Sorcery with Inspiration for further maintain and utility. 

These are your closing rune selections, giving your flat stat bonuses: 

As soon as completely happy together with your selections, you need to save your rune web page, prepared to make use of in ranked or draft. Now, you’re able to play.

As with every MOBA, League of Legends is advanced, stuffed with completely different champion stats. Under is a glossary of essentially the most generally used phrases seen when navigating by LoL rune pages.

Now you understand how to arrange a rune web page, listed below are six beginner-friendly suggestions to decide on the most effective runes. 

These new to League of Legends shouldn’t fear about customising their rune pages instantly. The preset default rune pages offered by Riot are nice for once you’re making an attempt to get acquainted with the sport. They aren’t totally optimised, however as a newbie, they’ll operate nicely sufficient. 

With all the pieces that League of Legends calls for gamers study, Runes can really feel overwhelming firstly, however the extra expertise you get, the extra you’ll perceive about Runes and what setups work greatest on your champion picks and playstyles.

Decide your most important and experiment with completely different rune pages in Draft Decide or SwiftPlay, like altering out Electrocure for Darkish Harvest when taking part in Ahri. In a match, marginal features will be the distinction between victory and defeat.

Totally different roles and lanes have completely different priorities, so it is smart that completely different runes work for various of us. 

Take into consideration your lane’s win situation and tailor your runes to assist that purpose, and don’t go utterly left-field like Precision Yuumi. 

Each two weeks, there are new League of Legends patch notes, buffing and nerfing all the pieces from champions, objects, and even runes. Be certain that to provide these a learn to see how runes change, guaranteeing that you simply at all times have the most effective choices in your Rune Web page.

There are websites like OP.GG that’ll present you the most well-liked setup and LoL runes guides on your champion, up to date persistently with every patch. These are a good way of studying the present meta whereas determining your individual preferences and what works/doesn’t be just right for you. 

Whereas it may be tempting to repeat no matter runes your favorite professional makes use of, context, like what their lane match-up was, is important. What works for them in professional play or high-elo possible received’t work in your ranked video games. Use their pages as a reference, however don’t blindly copy them. Take a look at your individual expertise and adapt primarily based in your match-up. The extra you play, the extra you’ll perceive how runes can be utilized to counter your opponent and improve your champion.

Whereas League’s Runes will be overwhelming, when you’ve received a grasp of this LoL rune information for newcomers, it’s going to begin to turn out to be muscle reminiscence. Runes are a significant a part of a League participant’s arsenal, together with their champion’s package and merchandise builds, so figuring out how they work is half the battle.

Studying the best rune setup for a selected state of affairs requires expertise. Enjoying persistently, practising typically, and profiting from on-line instruments will assist construct this expertise. The ranked grind to Challenger begins together with your keystone and rune path, so make it depend.