Patch 26.1b Notes – League of Legends

Posted on by U.GG

Following the release of the 26.1 update, League of Legend’s first micro-patch of 2026 has arrived, and it includes a handful of buffs, nerfs and adjustments. Check out the full patch updated 26.1 notes for additional details from Riot (source).

1/9/2026 Mid-Patch Updates

“Here’s a summary of the changes planned for the next update: “We have a few changes to 26.1 that we wanted to get out before the weekend. We have a few early balance changes, some quick fixes to ARAM Mayhem, and some bugfixes that we have ready to go. Appreciate all your reports and your early feedback on the new season!”

Clash Schedule Updates

“We’ve moved the first Clash of the year back one week.

Clash registration will now open on January 19th @ 11:00 AM (Local Time)

Tournament days will now be January 24th and 25th.”

ARAM/ARAM Mayhem Updates

  • We’ve disabled the Bastionbreaker item from ARAM and ARAM Mayhem.
  • We’ve temporarily disabled the Executioner augment from appearing for Gangplank due to an unintended interaction.
  • We’ve temporarily disabled the Flashy augment while we resolve some bugs that have popped up with it.
  • Fixed an issue that allowed the ability to roll multiples of the same augment and stack them.
  • We’ve identified an issue that caused two Stormrazors to appear in the shop.
  • Fixed an issue where Zeri could reach over the attack speed cap. (This was actually fixed in the original 16.1 patch but was missing from the notes)

Champions

Aphelios

See Highest Win Rate Aphelios Builds

Many of Aphelios’s abilities can crit, and while we compensated for this power increase, he’s still become one of the strongest champions in the game. We’re here to reduce some of that burst damage while preserving the power of his weaker AD-AS builds.

Passive – The Hitman and the Seer

  • Lethality per E rank: 5.5 ⇒ 4.5

Graves

See Highest Win Rate Graves Builds

Graves is looking worse for wear in the new season and seems to not need some of the preemptive crit damage mitigations we put in place. So we’re here to help his crit attacks have more oomph. Graves’s critical strikes are pretty complicated but the short of it is that now a crit will deal twice as much damage as a non-crit if all pellets hit.

Passive – New Destiny

  • Crit Scaling: 35% bonus crit damage ⇒ 50% bonus crit damage
  • Maximum damage on crit relative to non crit: 1.8x ⇒ 2x

Kayle

See Highest Win Rate Kayle Builds

Kayle – Q max is looking very strong this patch due to the top lane XP buffs. Removing some AP scaling we added back when there were less AP items available that improved attack power.

Passive – Divine Ascent

  • Attack Speed per stack: 6% (+1% per 100 AP) ⇒ 6%

Q – Radiant Blast

  • Mana Cost: 70 / 75 / 80 / 85 / 90 ⇒ 60 / 70 / 80 / 90 / 100
  • Slow: 26 / 32 / 38 / 44 / 50% ⇒ 25 / 30 / 35 / 40 / 45%

Nilah

See Highest Win Rate Nilah Builds

Nilah has been the biggest winner of this patch’s systemic changes to bot lane and so is deserving of a meaningful adjustment. Because she gets plenty of attack speed from her Q, we’re taking a chunk out of her base stat growth.

Base Stats
  • AS Growth: 2% ⇒ 1.25%

Q – Formless Blade

  • Crit scaling multiplier: 80% bonus crit damage ⇒ 70% bonus crit damage

Quinn

See Highest Win Rate Quinn Builds

Quinn has suffered more than most in the new season from systemic changes like the removal of Symbiotic Soles and role quests. Since she was hit hardest in top lane, we’re targeting her level scaling and giving a boost to her passive. This should further reward effective snowballing and buff the early trading she needs to get her quest online earlier, supporting Quinn players whether they want to continue playing a heavy roaming style or lean more into split pushing.

Base Stats
  • AD Growth: 2.7 ⇒ 3.2

Passive – Harrier

  • Base Cooldown: 8 seconds ⇒ 7 seconds

Rammus

See Highest Win Rate Rammus Builds

Rammus has had a lot of success with some of the new map changes. We still want him to maintain his identity as a particularly strong pick into an AD comp, but we look to curve a bit of that power against magic damage champs.

Base Stats
  • Health: 675 ⇒ 645

W – Defensive Ball Curl

  • Magic Resist: 27 / 32 / 37 / 42 / 47 ⇒ 20 / 25 / 30 / 35 / 40

Tryndamere

See Highest Win Rate Tryndamere Builds

We overcompensated for how much Tryndamere would gain from the base crit damage increases, so we’re here to make things better for him. We’re leading with a big E buff to make him less reliant on lucky crits for successful trades and help him not need a Tiamat for wave clear. He’s also getting a W slow duration to make him better at taking extended fights.

W – Mocking Shout

  • Slow Duration: 2.5 seconds ⇒ 3.25 seconds

E – Spinning Slash

  • Base Damage: 70 / 105 / 140 / 175 / 210 ⇒ 80 / 120 / 160 / 200 / 240

Essence Reaver

  • Total Cost: 2900 Gold ⇒ 3050 Gold
  • Recipe: Sheen + Caulfield’s Warhammer + Cloak of Agility + 350 Gold ⇒ Sheen + Caulfield’s Warhammer + Cloak of Agility + 500 Gold
  • Attack Damage: 55 Gold ⇒ 50

Bugfixes

  • Fixed several issues where Actualizer could incorrectly increase mana costs indefinitely.

Known Issues

  • Some settings are not available when in Ranked games.
  • When in spectator mode if you skip forward in time towers will remain standing after being destroyed.
  • Winter Rift Baron is still appearing. (sorry Baron just wants to be on the Winter Rift a little longer, we’ll get him to put the mittens away later)

Patch Notes Preview

General

  • Patch overall has landed within bounds and a few balance outliers are expected, but nothing major.
  • Riot continues to monitor things like Faelights, Homeguards, general game snowballing and will have more details to share on Monday, January 12, after they’ve observed more of how things are playing out.
  • More details on how the team currently feels about role power is coming on Monday.
  • Game times are slightly up by around 1.5% on average, but long and short games are mostly the same.
  • Only the most extreme outliers are being addressed in this pass, they’re saving the rest for patch 26.2.

Bot Lane

  • Essence Reaver is the biggest outlier right now, so it’s being nerfed to see what it does.

Miscellaneous

  • They’re monitoring weak/strong items, including Bandlepipes, Dusk & Dawn, etc.
  • Power levels within the jungle role are looking a bit off, but nothing micro-patch worthy outside of Graves and Rammus.
  • Overall, AD junglers have dropped some, Tank junglers are up.

Non-Gameplay Related

  • Riot continues to triage a few things with Demacia Rising and there will be updates from LoLDev when it’s back online.
  • They intend to rectify KR and JP accounts who landed in the wrong Ranked buckets as soon as possible.
  • Some players are not receiving Aegis when they are autofilled and Riot’s investigating the root cause of the bug.
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