Penalties

Blizzard Entertainment may issue penalties to players that have violated Blizzard's Code of Conduct or repeatedly left matches.

Code of Conduct Violations

Blizzard's Code of Conduct is designed to foster a fun and safe environment for all players. As such, players found violating the Code of Conduct may be penalized through a warning, silence, suspension or permanent ban.

Additionally, penalties within the reporting system may also demote a player's Endorsement Rating to Level 0. Coming later in 2024, anyone with a Level 0 Endorsement Rating will be prevented from using any text or voice chat in their matches. These privileges can be restored once the player reaches Level 1 again, which is done by playing their best, helping their team, and communicating with the in-game ping system.

Reporting

In-game, players violating the Code of Conduct can be reported by right-clicking the player's name in the chat window or Social menu and selecting "Report". Players will first have to select the most appropriate of four categories, optionally select any amount of subcategories under that category, and lastly may provide freely written additional feedback.

Violation categories

	Inappropriate Communication	Naming	Cheating	Behavior
Subcategories	Text chat Voice chat Spam	Inappropriate name	Hacking Boosting/deranking	AFK Intentionally feeding Blocking team progress Griefing

Warning notice

If a player is reported several times in Overwatch 2 for violating the in-game rules, the game will send the player a warning letting them know that they will need to be careful, or they may get a silence or suspension in game. This is completely automated and cannot be seen or modified by Customer Support.

Silence penalty

Accounts that are reported multiple times for Spam or Abusive Chat may be penalized with a silence penalty. The severity of this penalty increases each time it is applied to the account. These penalties begin with silences, but repeated violation of chat behavior can result in suspensions up to account closures. Additionally, their Endorsement level gets set to 0, which is only possible by having their account actioned. The chat penalties will persist as long as they remain at level 0.

The following list describes what players can or cannot do while silenced:

Players Cannot	Players Can
Use Team chat in game	Send whispers to friends
Chat in Private Game channels	Use Group chat in game
Chat in General channels
Chat in Match channels
Send whispers to non-friends
Reply to whispers from non-friends
Post on the forums

Additionally, the following points apply to all Blizzard games:

• Abusive chat reports will fall off after a predetermined amount of time.
• Multiple abusive chat reports from the same person do not stack — only reports from unique players are counted towards a silence penalty.
• Being reported for abusive chat while silenced does not count against the reported player.
• The number of abusive chat reports necessary to penalize the account remains the same, regardless of past penalties.

Suspensions and bans

Blizzard may suspend or ban accounts for serious or repetitive violations of their Code of Conduct. Players whose accounts have been suspended or banned will be sent an email with details about the violation.

Leaver penalties

Choosing to leave a game while it's in progress puts every remaining teammate at a disadvantage, and makes the game less enjoyable for all involved.

Repeatedly leaving games will move players into "leaver status" until they successfully finish enough games to remove that status. If they are currently in leaver status, their player card will tell them how many games they must finish to leave that status in the upper-right corner. Game Masters will not overturn leaver penalties.

Starting in Season 10, the development team made adjustments to discourage leaving Unranked games and took a firmer stance on leavers in Competitive Play. Penalty duration is based on how many games are left out of the last 20 played.

Unranked

Connection problems sometimes cause players to drop, so there is a threshold for leaving Unranked games before a player is penalized.

Unranked Modes

(Out of last 20 games played)

Games Left	Leaver Penalty
1	Warning only
2	2 minutes
4	10 minutes
6	2 hours
10+	48 hours

Competitive Play

In Competitive Play, leaving a match at any point before the "Match Complete" screen will contribute towards leaver status. In addition to the 75% experience penalty received, the player may be restricted from joining a Competitive match for a pre-determined amount of time:

Competitive Play

(Out of last 20 games played)

Games Left	Leaver Penalty
1	15 minutes
2	2 hours
3	8 hours
4	20 hours
5	Competitive Season Ban
10 throughout the season	Competitive Season Ban

Leaving more matches will increase a player's penalty, lower their skill rating, and eventually result in a Competitive Season Ban (including the loss of any rewards they would have earned). Multiple Competitive Season Bans can lead to a Permanent Competitive Play Ban.

In addition to Unranked games, Competitive matches now count toward a player’s last 20 games played.

Appealing account action

If a player's game licenses has been silenced, suspended, or closed due to a violation, they can appeal the penalty by submitting a support ticket. Warning notices and leaver penalties cannot be appealed.

If a player's account is banned from Competitive Play during three separate seasons, their account may be permanently banned from Competitive Play. These account restrictions cannot be overturned, regardless of the reason.

External links

• Overwatch 2 support