How will League of Legends Patch 26.2 affect the esports scene?

Riot Games is bringing forth several champion buffs and nerfs in the latest League of Legends Patch 26.2 update.

Two weeks after the start of the new season, the League of Legends developer is looking to tune down some of the best-performing champions in pro play and solo queue, while buffing six champions. Patch 26.2 is scheduled to go live on Thursday, January 22nd.

Esports Insider dives into some of the biggest changes and how they could impact the competitive ecosystem.

The focus of the second update in the 2026 season is on jungle champions, with nerfs targeting Gwen, Jayce, Malphite, Nunu and Willump, Lillia, and Zed.

In particular, Gwen and Lillia have been performing exceptionally well, with both their win rates above 52%, according to the data platform lolalytics. The former has been abusing the new item, Dusk and Dawn, and both champions are taking advantage of the power farming meta in the jungle.

With the introduction of Faelights, which lower the success rate of ganks, as well as the removal of Atakhan, junglers are now focused on farming as quickly as possible to gain resources and experience on the map.

Zed and Jayce have also been quite strong in recent weeks, with the assassin getting a major nerf to its jungle monster modifier. Jayce, despite the lower damage on the Q, should still be a powerful pick due to his flex potential. Speaking of flex picks, Malphite is also getting nerfed due to its high pick status, both as a top laner and a jungler.

Support item Bandlepipes is also getting a major nerf, with the item’s cost increasing by 300 gold. Built by nearly all support champions with crowd controls, its value was way too high at its current state, according to Riot Games.

Among the buffs, the main benefactors of the patch are expected to be Taliyah and Varus. The latter is getting extra damage on both his Q and W, which should push him higher in the priority list.

Taliyah, on the other hand, is getting increased bonus damage to monsters, which might push her to become a flex pick between mid and jungle, further increasing her priority.

While the Master Yi and Viego buffs should improve their clear speed, the jungle meta is still set to favour other power farming champions.

Even though it’s still early to make a clear breakdown of the competitive meta, the first indications seem to be pointing at a mid-focused meta.

Teams that can snowball their respective mid laners on scaling mages will generally have a higher chance of success. To achieve this, teams need to have a strong priority in the bottom lane, which will then allow the support and jungle to make plays on the rest of the map.

Nonetheless, the bot lane will still need good late-game scaling, given the increased power from the introduction of Role Quests. This is why the bot lane meta is primarily dominated by champions like Yunara, Corki, and Aphelios, as all these champions have some of the highest DPS in the late stages of the game.

The only outlier was Varus due to his stronger early-game with his long-range poke. Given he’s getting buffed in Patch 26.2, fans could see more of him in the coming weeks.

Aside from that, however, the meta is set to be somewhat similar. Jayce and Sivir might drop in priority following the nerfs, but both are likely going to stay relevant, especially in the Fearless best-of-series era.