Destiny 2 has seen a radical rework of its ability cooldown system since the Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack. Abilities now have unique cooldowns, Super energy received an overhaul, and many abilities had their cooldowns tweaked.

If you haven't played Destiny 2 recently, this can be a shock to come back to. And for veteran players, figuring out exact ability cooldowns can be a pain. This guide covers how ability cooldowns work in Destiny 2, explains what Super tiers and active Super generation methods are, and we cover every single ability cooldown in the game. Use the table of contents above to jump to any section that interests you.

Updated January 12, 2024, by Charles Burgar: Season 23 has added a new mechanic where abilities with longer base cooldowns receive less energy from armor mods. This has fundamentally changed buildcrafting for both PvE and PvP. Worse yet, it's completely unexplained in-game.

We've updated this guide to explain how this mod scalar system works, how it scales with base cooldown, and what mods this system affects. We've also done a major pass on our cooldown tables to include accurate numbers as of Season 23, including exact cooldown values for Towering Bastion and Rally Bastion Barricades for Sentinel Titans. If you want to see how Season 23 impacted mod values, check out our Armor Mods and Armor Charge guide.

What Are Variable Ability Cooldowns?

Destiny 2's abilities each have a unique cooldown that Bungie refers to as the variable ability cooldown system. In essence, Bungie can tweak the cooldowns of each ability in Destiny 2 without impacting the cooldown of similar abilities, something that was impossible before the Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack was released.

Each grenade, melee ability, class ability, and Super has a unique cooldown. For example, Duskfield Grenades recharge in 91 seconds while Glacier Grenades take 121 seconds to charge. Both grenades have different cooldowns despite being a part of the same subclass.

While abilities have differing cooldowns, most abilities tend to fall under certain cooldown bands that Bungie refers to as tiers.

Ability And Super Tiers Explained

You might have heard some community members or developers refer to some abilities as a "T3" or "T4" ability, but what does that mean? Simply put, tiers refer to a selection of abilities that all share the same base cooldown. The higher the ability tier, the shorter the cooldown.

For example, the shortest base Super cooldown is 7:15. This cooldown is shared between the Warlock's Well of Radiance Super (Solar) and the Titan's Ward of Dawn Super (Void). T4 Supers have the shortest cooldowns, so Well of Radiance and Ward of Dawn are both considered T4 Supers.

If Bungie decided to nerf their base cooldowns, they'd move them to T3 or T2, sharing the same base cooldown as any Supers in that tier. This system also impacts how much Super energy you get while in combat, but we'll cover that in the next section; it's very complicated.

This terminology is only used outside the game in This Week in Destiny posts, patch notes, and community-made videos, so don't worry about base cooldown tiers if you're a newcomer or returning to the game. Just know that not all abilities have the same cooldown rate.

This tier differentiation between ability cooldowns is not referring to your Discipline, Intellect, or Strength tiers. You can have T10 Discipline for a slow charging grenade or T1 Intellect for the fastest charging Super in the game. Bungie solely uses this terminology to clump base cooldown bands together.

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Passive And Active Super Regeneration

If you're a returning Destiny 2 player, Super energy received an overhaul in the Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack. Supers have passive and active regeneration sources, regardless of build. Let's break that down:

• Passive Regeneration: A Super's base cooldown rate.
  • Modified by the Intellect stat.

• Active Regeneration: Killing enemies, dealing damage, and taking damage charges your Super faster.
  • Modified by weapon perks, armor mods, and how much damage is being dealt/taken.

Every Super in Destiny 2 will passively charge over a lengthy period. This passive rate can be accelerated by increasing the Intellect stat through certain armor pieces, mods, and subclass Fragments.

Active regeneration is much more involved. In essence, the more active you are in combat, the faster you'll get your Super. Killing enemies and actively taking damage will charge your Super much faster, regardless of your Intellect stat or general build.

Active Super Regeneration Explained

All sources of damage from your Guardian will grant a small chunk of Super energy. The amount of energy gained depends on a few factors:

1. The damage inflicted
2. The weapon type used to inflict said damage (Primary, Special, Heavy)
3. The rate at which you damage the target
4. The enemy damaged
5. Your Super's cooldown tier (not your Intellect)

Intellect has no impact on the amount of Super energy gained from damaging enemies or taking damage.

Dealing Damage

The most important factor is your weapon type, both for PvE and PvP. Primary weapons give the most Super energy per damage dealt, with Specials and Heavies granting around half as much.

For example, dealing 41,200 damage with an Auto Rifle will give about 4% of your Super, assuming you're using a T5 Super. If you used a Special or Heavy weapon and dealt the same amount of damage, you'd get about 2% Super energy instead.

Overkill damage does not grant additional Super energy.

Super energy scalars are different in PvP, but the concept is the same. In PvP, Specials give about 40% less Super energy than Primaries, as demonstrated in Castle Content's YouTube video on this very topic. Heavy weapons presumably give even less. This is regardless of your Super's cooldown tier.

With that said, it's important to note that Special and Heavy weapons have far better DPS than Primaries. PvE players can use Machine Guns or Fusion Rifles and receive the same Super returns per second, potentially more, as if they used a Primary.

The conversion rate of damage to Super might be less efficient on Specials and Heavies, yet that's counteracted by their far better DPS values in PvE. For PvP, this system highly rewards players for using their Primary in duels, granting far less energy if you slay out with your Special.

If you'd like a more thorough breakdown of this system for PvP, we recommend watching Castle Content's YouTube video on how Super cooldowns work.

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Taking Damage

Fortunately, the correlation between Super energy and damage received is much simpler. The magnitude of damage you receive determines how much Super energy you get. The harder the hit is, the more energy you'll get. Small hits, such as a Thrall's melee attack, give a sliver of Super energy (0.25% or so). Harder-hitting attacks scale to around 0.5% or 1% of your Super.

In the Crucible, you also gain Super energy for taking damage—albeit at a reduced rate. You gain energy equal to 67% of the damage you took from enemy Guardians. For example, if you took 600 damage with a T1 Super, you'd gain Super energy equal to dealing 400 Primary damage yourself (about 2.3%).

With that said, overshields completely disable this mechanic. If you have any overshields active—even a sliver from Whisper of Rime—you won't gain any Super energy from taking damage. Should your overshield break from enemy fire, you'll need to wait for your shields to fully recharge before this mechanic works again. This behavior is present in all activities, not just PvP.

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Super Cooldown Tiers

If things weren't complicated enough, your Super's cooldown tier also impacts how much energy you receive from dealing and receiving damage. The higher your Super's cooldown tier is, the more energy you'll receive from dealing and taking damage.

Bonus energy received from higher tier Supers is also affected by the Special and Heavy energy scalars we talked about earlier, but here's a rough rundown of the bonus energy you can expect from each tier. Values for this table are based on Castle Content's findings.

Values are for Primary weapons. Special and Heavy weapons gain a smaller bonus due to their Super energy scalars.

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Other Ways Of Gaining Super Energy

Dealing and taking damage aren't your only two ways of earning Super energy. There are a few more Super energy sources that are worth mentioning:

• Killing enemies
• Picking up Orbs of Power
• Using certain weapon perks (notably Thresh)

Defeating enemies in Destiny 2—both in PvE and PvP—will grant a chunk of Super energy. PvE values seem to remain consistent from Shadowkeep, although PvP values were adjusted with the Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack. The table below showcases rough approximations of how much energy you'll receive from kills and assists.

Beyond kills, you can also earn more Super energy from Orbs of Power, certain weapon perks, and armor mods. Credit to Light.gg for many of the values listed below:

Armor mods can be stacked multiple times to increase their energy returns, albeit with diminishing returns. Exact values can be found in our Armor Mods and Armor Charge guide.

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Ability Mod Energy Scalars

Season 23 has adjusted all mods that impact ability cooldowns with an additional effectiveness scalar. Any armor mod that grants ability energy will provide diminished returns based on your ability's base cooldown.

For example, the Impact Induction mod grants 10% grenade energy at base. If you trigger this mod while using Firebolt Grenades, the fastest charging grenade for Solar, Impact Induction will grant the full 10%. But if you decide to use Solar Grenades, the slowest charging grenade, the mod now grants 5% ability energy.

Discipline, Intellect, and Strength have no impact on this system.

The slower your ability's base cooldown is, the more severe this penalty becomes, up to -50% effectiveness. Armor stats have no bearing on this scalar either; it's a fixed rate like Super scalars. Reddit user u/engineeeeer7 has discovered the exact values for each ability that you can view in their post. These values are also shown in our cooldown tables.

This scalar system affects the following mods:

• Gloves: Impact Induction, Momentum Transfer, Bolstering Detonation, Focusing Strike, All Kickstart Mods
• Boots: Innervation, Invigoration, Insulation, Absolution, Orbs of Restoration
• Class Item: Bomber, Outreach, Distribution

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All Grenade Cooldowns

Mod effectiveness values are derived from u/engineeeeer7 Reddit post on the topic. Credit to them for the exact values.

Base Cooldowns (Tier 3 Discipline)

Grenade	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Flashbang	1:31	85%
Arcbolt	1:45	77%
Skip	1:45	77%
Pulse	2:01	68%
Storm	2:01	68%
Flux	2:32	50%
Lightning	2:32	50%

read more

Grenade	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Firebolt	1:04	100%
Fusion	1:13	95%
Healing	1:31	85%
Swarm	1:31	85%
Incendiary	1:45	77%
Thermite	2:01	68%
Tripmine	2:01	68%
Solar	2:32	50%

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Grenade	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Magnetic	1:45	77%
Scatter	1:45	77%
Spike	2:01	68%
Suppressor	2:01	68%
Void Wall	2:01	68%
Axiom Bolt	2:32	50%
Vortex	2:32	50%

read more

Grenade	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Duskfield	1:31	85%
Coldsnap	2:01	68%
Glacier	2:01	68%

read more

Grenade	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Grapple	1:22	90%
Threadling	2:01	68%
Shackle	2:32	50%

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Grenade Tiers

For general readability, we're going to clump most grenade cooldowns into tiers, similar to how Supers work. Tiers referenced in the Discipline cooldowns table refer to these grenades.

Discipline Cooldowns

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All Melee Cooldowns

Base Cooldowns (T3 Strength)

Hunter
Melee Ability	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Combination Blow	0:40	100%
Disorienting Blow	1:40	83%
Titan
Seismic Strike	1:31	79%
Thunder Clap	1:31	79%
Ballistic Slam	1:54	70%
Warlock
Chain Lightning	1:31	79%
Ball Lightning	1:54	70%

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Hunter
Melee Ability	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Knife Trick	1:22	83%
Lightweight Knife	1:40	75%
Proximity Throwing Knife	1:51	71%
Weighted Throwing Knife	2:17	60%
Titan
Hammer Strike	1:31	79%
Throwing Hammer	1:31	79%
Warlock
Incinerator Snap	1:23	82%
Celestial Fire	1:52	70%

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Hunter
Melee Ability	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Snare Bomb	1:30	79%
Titan
Shield Bash	1:31	79%
Shield Throw	1:31	79%
Warlock
Pocket Singularity	1:31	79%

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Hunter
Melee Ability	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Withering Blade	1:40	75%
Titan
Shiver Strike	1:54	69%
Warlock
Penumbral Blast	1:41	75%

read more

Hunter
Melee Ability	Base Cooldown	Mod Effectiveness
Threaded Spike	1:40	75%
Titan
Frenzied Blade	1:54	69%
Warlock
Arcane Needle	1:31	79%

read more

Melee Ability Tiers

To make this article and the Strength cooldowns table easier to read, we're going to clump most melee abilities into tiers. Melee abilities with unique cooldowns are listed in a separate table. The Strength cooldowns table refers to these abilities with each tier column:

Some melee abilities have cooldowns that are ± 3 seconds off these base tiers. These abilities have been bundled into their closest tier to prevent table bloat. Abilities with notably different base cooldowns are showcased below.

*Cooldown is slightly higher or lower than the listed tier.

**Tempest Strike's in-game cooldown is incorrect and is treated as a T3 ability.

Strength Cooldowns

Where's Tempest Strike?

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Despite Tempest Strike's in-game description, it seems to use the same cooldown as a Tier 3 melee ability (1:31 base cooldown at 30 Strength).

We've tested cooldowns at all Strength tiers and received the same results as T3 melee abilities like Chain Lightning and Thunder Clap. We aren't sure if this is intentional or a bug given the in-game listed cooldown of 3:23.

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All Class Ability Cooldowns

Base Cooldowns (T3 Mobility, Resilience, Recovery)

*This ability is currently bugged and is unaffected by the mod scalar changes.

Class Ability Cooldowns

Titans using the Citan's Ramparts Exotic will suffer from a 70% cooldown penalty for all Towering Barricade types, including Bastion Barricades.

The Hunter's Mask of Bakris Exotic uses the Marksman's Dodge cooldown with a ten-second delay, even if you're using Gambler's Dodge.

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All Super Cooldowns

Base Cooldowns (T3 Intellect)

Intellect Cooldowns

*There are currently no T1 or T5 Supers in Destiny 2.

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