Apex Legends will let you play solo with no-fill matchmaking

Apex Legends is built as a team game, and while various limited-time modes have offered different team sizes, there’s never been a permanent way to play solo. That’s finally changing with the Chaos Theory Collection Event update, which adds no-fill matchmaking to the game. You’ll still be playing in the standard team modes, but now you can go solo without getting matched into a squad.

There’s going to be a ‘fill matchmaking’ checkbox next to the mode select in the lobby. If you uncheck that box, you will go alone in your chosen mode. Solo versus squads of three in trios, for example. You can also go no-fill with a party, if you want to, say, play in a duo squad against trios.

This will only work in standard modes – not ranked – and the devs say there will be a maximum of six no-fill players in any one match. Still, this will provide you a terrific way to mop up challenges, quickly get into warm up fights, or experiment with new weapons or characters without the pressure of supporting a whole team.

“We still strongly believe that, at its best, Apex Legends is a game about teamplay,” the devs say in the announcement blog. “But we’re launching this No-Fill matchmaking as an option for solo players because we think it gives a lot of creative opportunities for you to play the game your way.”

Apex Legends relies far more on complementary hero abilities than other battle royale games, so it makes sense that Respawn is keeping the focus on teamplay. Still, it’s good to see players who prefer to go it a lone getting some options.