There is but one weapon in Cyberpunk 2077 that can turn V into a swirling tornado of death and destruction, and that's the monowire. With this piece of deadly cyberware, you can slice everyone and everything around you to ribbons. And with the Phantom Liberty DLC, you can directly upload quickhacks to your hapless victims.

Although the monowire has received significant changes since its initial introduction, it remains one of the most potent melee weapons in Cyberpunk for both silent assassins and less-silent mercenaries. If you’re ready to give your arms a wildly lethal weapon, read on to find out how.

Updated February 7, 2024, by Sean Murray: The monowire has changed a lot since Cyberpunk 2077 was first released. As of the 2.0 update, the monowire has received significant changes that required an extensive rewrite of this guide. We've updated the information found below to be accurate as of the date listed.

Why Use The Monowire

With so many great melee weapons in the game, it can be hard to forfeit them in exchange for this cybernetic. It's one of the reasons this tool has stayed a secret for as long as it has. But players are learning that there is more to it than meets the eye.

Those who master using melee weapons will end up loving the monowire just as much.

Though V holds the weapon like a garrote wire, it's deployed more like a whip in practice. The range is much further than it appears on-screen or in the animation, but after a couple of tries, you'll see that it has a better effective range than most shotguns.

The stamina drain is also much more friendly than a sleek and lightweight katana. It makes sense because it is a string after all, but it's a nice touch that really makes the monowire shine in longer fights.

How To Use The Monowire Effectively

Using the monowire is relatively straightforward. Simply equip the monowire at a ripperdoc, then activate your arm weapon through the weapon select tool. Now, you're ready to start slicing and dicing.

The quick attack swings the monowire in a wide arc that can hit multiple enemies at once. Hold the attack button to unleash a charged attack that swings the monowire in a downward arc in front of you. This attack has less potential to hit adjacent enemies but will do massive damage to a single target.

What's best about the monowire is that it will stagger most low and medium-threat targets, preventing them from retaliating while you're whipping them to shreds.

Like all melee weapons, the monowire requires stamina to wield. However, the stamina cost for the monowire is fairly light (similar to a knife or small one-handed weapon). Even with a few points into Body, you'll be able to wield the monowire to deadly effect.

The monowire is also completely silent, making it the ideal weapon for sneaky jobs and assassinations.

A useful strategy is to attack individual enemies from stealth. Once stun-locked, whip them down, and then proceed to the next enemy and repeat the procedure. Groups of enemies can also be dealt with similarly so long as they're standing fairly close together.

The wide arc of the monowire's attack can make it difficult to wield in heavily-populated areas. If you hit a civilian, the cops won't be happy and V will either have to take them down or bribe the police to get off the hook.

How To Get The Monowire

The Monowire can be obtained from any ripperdoc starting at level 10. The rarirty of the monowires available increases every five levels. It requires eight cyberware capacity to equip.

Once the monowire has been installed at a ripperdoc, simply select the monowire in your weapons wheel to equip it.

Types Of Monowire

When Cyberpunk 2077 was first released, different upgrades could change the monowire's damage type. As of the 2.0 update, a monowire's damage is determined by the specific type of monowire purchased at a ripperdoc.

There are four different types of monowire, each dealing a different damage type and potentially applying a different status ailment. Each monowire is also attuned to a different attribute which provides a 0.5-percent damage bonus for each point.

Which monowire you choose should align with your highest attribute to maximize the monowire's damage. If your character has 20 Intelligence and 10 Reflexes, the regular monowire will receive a 10 percent damage bonus while the electrifying monowire will only deal an additional five percent.

Perks That Affect The Monowire

The monowire is no longer considered a blade or bludgeoning weapon as of the 2.0 update, so relatively few perks affect it. That said, there are a few perks that enhance the monowire.

Body

There's only one perk that affects the monowire in the Body tree, and that's Juggernaut. It provides a flat 10 percent damage boost to all damage, not just the monowire, but it's a notable increase.

This perk requires at least 15 points into Body and to have fully unlocked the Adrenaline Rush perk. This can be a useful perk to have unlocked, however, most builds that push the Body tree use gorilla arms rather than the monowire.

Intelligence

Intelligence is likely where most monowire users spend most of their attribute points. The monowire is a key weapon in a netrunner's arsenal and receives two big perks in the Intelligence tree.

Finisher: Live Wire provides finisher animations as well as a method of recouping a significant quantity of RAM. Siphon further enhances the monowire by recovering RAM with every strike, allowing you to continuously apply quickhacks.

Technical Ability

All types of monowire will provide different stat modifiers. Perks within the Technical Ability tree, specificall All Things Cyber, Driver Update, Chipware Connoisseur, and License to Chrome, improve these stats.

While many of these stats will not directly affect the monowire's damage outpit, modifiers that effect melee damage and melee attack speed will.

Edgerunner unlocks the Fury condition, which provides a massive damage increase for a limited time. The damage boost of Fury will improve your monowire immensely, allowing you to tear through enemies with ease.

Relic Perks

Those with the Phantom Liberty DLC will want to unlock the Jailbreak perk first. This upgrades the monowire to inflict a control quickhack with a fully-charged heavy attack. This can be further upgraded with the Data Tunneling perk to apply that same quickhack to nearby enemies struck with a swiping attack.

The best control quickhacks to pair with Jailbreak are Cyberware Malfunction and Cripple Movement.

Cyberware Malfunction can stack up to eight times, disabling enemy cyberware and increasing the damage they take with each stack. Cripple Movement only needs to be applied once to inflict an additional 15 percent melee damage to the target.

Vulnerability Analytics will cause vulnerabilities to appear in enemy defenses, which your monowire can exploit for additional damage. Machine Learning merely increases how often these vulnerabilities appear and the critical damage dealt.

Cyberware That Boosts The Monowire

As of the 2.0 update, cyberware are the most important items for improving your character. These cyberware in particular will improve the monowire by the statistics listed.

Which Cyberware To Use For A Monowire Build

Every monowire build should install the Dense Marrow, Adrenaline Booster, and Microrotors cyberware. Whether you use a cyberdeck, berserk, or sandevistan will depend on personal preference and the additional benefits each of these operating systems provide.

Sandevistan users will find the Militech "Falcon" to offer the most consistent increase in damage as headshots can be difficult to achieve with the monowire. The BioDyne Berserk, once fully upgraded, will outclass the Militech Berserk provided you remain at high health. Both cyberdecks offer a number of additional benefits for netrunners that should better determine which one to use.