ARC Raiders: the Trials system guide — ranks, Scorta and patch 1.36 to dominate Season 5 (2026)

Since its high-profile landing in late 2025, ARC Raiders has established an extraction meta that's more tactical than its competitors, but also a jargon that still trips up many French-speaking players. Top of the list of misunderstandings: the famous "battle pass". Good news, it doesn't exist. Instead, Embark Studios built a system called Trials, entirely free, structured around weekly ranks, divisions of one hundred Raiders, and cosmetic rewards handed out at each tier. With the launch of patch 1.36 on July 7, Season 5 "Prove Your Mettle" shook things up: new Scorta outfit, separate Solo/Duo/Trio matchmaking, boosted Turbine loot, and a THE FINALS crossover. Here's how to progress fast, without spending a cent and without burning through all your stims.

How Trials works: forget the premium battle pass

Unlike a Fortnite or a Call of Duty, ARC Raiders doesn't sell a paid track with locked tiers. The term "Battle Pass" may circulate on forums, but it unofficially refers to the Trials circuit, which remains 100% free. No reward is hidden behind a real-money wall: the Season 5 Scorta, the Season 4 Blindspot, the Expedition 4 Zenith, all of it unlocks just by playing. The premium store does exist, but it only covers one-off cosmetics (the Store Update 1.37 on July 14 notably pushed a new Triumph Set), never Trials progression.

In practical terms, Trials is a competitive seasonal ladder grafted onto the classic Raid mode. Every week, five challenges appear, you accumulate points in-game, you extract to validate them, and your best score is compared against 99 other players in your division. You climb, you drop, you collect exclusive cosmetics. Simple on paper, demanding in practice.

The 14 ranks, from Rookie I to Cantina Legend

The Trials pyramid has fourteen tiers split into five main ranks, plus two elite echelons. Here is the exact structure, worth memorizing even before your first Trials extraction.

Cantina Legend is reserved for the top 1,000 Raiders worldwide at the Hotshot rank. In other words: it's a global top ranking, not just an end-of-season tier. For the base Scorta, aiming for Tryhard II is enough — an achievable goal within three to four weeks for a regular player.

Divisions of 100: the real promotion mechanic

At the start of every week, you're placed back into an anonymous division of 100 Raiders in the same sub-rank as you. On Sunday evening, the division is sorted by cumulative best score per challenge. The top brackets move up, the bottom brackets move down, and depending on the exact position, the promotion can be single, double, or even triple. Another subtlety confirmed in Season 5: skipping a week (no challenge completed) almost always triggers a demotion, even if you were comfortably placed the week before.

An important new feature of the current season: the Hotshot and Cantina Legend ranks no longer play within a division. They switch to a single global leaderboard, which explains why the top hundred spots change hands every night thanks to 90-minute raids from Korean and Scandinavian tryhards.

Finally, remember one sneaky rule: at the start of each new season, you begin two ranks below your previous final placement. A Daredevil II from Season 4 Blindspot therefore started Season 5 Scorta at Wildcard III. There's no way to immediately rush back to your previous position — Embark wants everyone to climb back up.

Season 5 "Prove Your Mettle": dates, Scorta outfit, and bonuses

Season 5 started on July 7, 2026 at 12 PM UTC, alongside the Fourth Expedition, and ends on September 30 at 07 AM UTC. That's roughly twelve weeks, exactly like Season 4 "Blindspot" before it. This regularity makes Trials an excellent barometer for planning your play time: aiming for one rank per month is enough to reach Daredevil without pushing too hard.

The centerpiece reward, the Scorta, is a heavy juggernaut-inspired outfit, complete with metal shoulder plates and a full helmet. It's unlocked piece by piece:

• Rookie I to Rookie III: individual pieces (boots, backpack, helmet).
• Tryhard II: full outfit for the first time.
• Wildcard I: Green Bruiser backpack and Pressure Gauge charm.
• Daredevil II: Hydraulic Pump attachment and "Come at me" emote.
• Hotshot: exclusive red color variant.
• Cantina Legend: blue variant and global leaderboard tag.

All of these rewards are permanent and will never return to the shop. Miss them during the twelve weeks, and the red Scorta is lost for good. That's why skipping even a single week can cost you dearly.

Five challenges per week: the golden "extract or lose" rule

Every Monday at noon UTC, five new objectives replace the previous ones. They cover a wide range of gameplay: dealing damage to specific ARC variants with certain weapons, absorbing Pop explosions up close, searching unique containers, eliminating a specific type of wildlife, planting mines. Since Season 4, these challenges are no longer locked to a specific Map Condition, which finally fixes the "bad draw" problem that used to prevent some players from progressing.

The golden rule hasn't changed: points only count if you extract. Die at the final chokepoint and your 400-point Search run goes straight in the trash. The upside: only your best score per challenge is kept. So you can keep trying indefinitely until you land a truly great score, then lock it in with a clean extraction.

A little tip from the community: always start with Search-type challenges. They provide reliable points (loot from specific containers, without mandatory confrontation) and let you lock in a solid score base before tackling the riskier PvE or anti-Raiders challenges.

Expeditions, Raider Tokens and Blueprints: the parallel track

Trials isn't the only progression path. Alongside it, Expeditions unfold a short circuit (13 days) centered on veterans. The Fourth Expedition, launched on July 7, completely overhauled the formula: more skill points, more chest bonuses, but a cumulative damage scale across all runs.

The five current tiers:

1. 5,000 damage — 1 random Blueprint + 150 Raider Tokens.
2. 10,000 damage — 1 Blueprint + 150 Raider Tokens.
3. 30,000 damage — 1 Blueprint + 150 Raider Tokens.
4. 50,000 damage — 1 Blueprint + 150 Raider Tokens.
5. 100,000 damage — 1 Blueprint + 150 Raider Tokens.

That's a total of 750 Raider Tokens for a full cycle. The distinction is crucial: Blueprints are temporary (they disappear when the next Expedition begins), while Raider Tokens are permanent. They're your war chest. You then spend them at the cosmetic store to buy outfits, bags, and attachments without ever touching your credit card.

The Fourth Expedition's headline reward, the Zenith outfit, permanently replaces the old evolving Patchwork set. It goes for a balaclava/urban operator look that stands in sharp contrast to the game's usual retro-futuristic style.

Patch 1.36: separated matchmaking, buffed Turbine, and fixes

The 1.36.0 Live Update on July 7 brought three structural changes every Trials runner needs to know about.

Separate Solo / Duo / Trio matchmaking. Embark now tracks your match history separately depending on team size. No more frustrating delays when switching between solo and trio play: the system keeps a distinct "profile" for each mode and matches you faster. Direct impact on Trials: solo players are no longer systematically pushed around by coordinated trios, which rebalances the PvP challenges.

Boosted Turbine loot. The amount of loot dropped by ARC Turbines has been "significantly increased," according to the official patch notes. A risky Turbine run can now fuel a whole week's worth of crafting, provided you've got the firepower to take it down.

Useful bug fixes. Weapons now finally display their installed mods when dropped on the ground, avoiding disastrous pickups. The Marco outfit's clipping issue has been fixed, and the missing color variants of the Bog Walker Set have been restored, with automatic refunds for affected players.

Also worth noting: the Store Update 1.37.0 on July 14 introduced a full store redesign and the Triumph Set, without touching gameplay.

THE FINALS crossover: Azimuth and Archeologist free until July 30

Embark Studios is capitalizing on the fact that it's developing two games in parallel. Until July 30, 2026 at 3 PM CEST, any player who completes specific contracts in THE FINALS unlocks the Azimuth outfit and the Archeologist backpack in ARC Raiders. The bundle then disappears permanently from the game — another cosmetic not to miss.

In practice, all you need to do is open THE FINALS, complete the sponsored contracts in the event hub, then log back into ARC Raiders: the bundle appears in your locker with no extra steps required. About twenty minutes for a classy premium outfit skin — that's the best cosmetic ROI of the season.

Five tips to finish Season 5 at Hotshot

1. Play in a trio starting at Wildcard. From this tier onward, the damage and looting objectives demand area control that's impossible to achieve solo on Buried City or Stella Montis. A dedicated healer, a DPS, and a scout will double your average score.
2. Prioritize Riven Tides on Monday. The new POI Panorama Azurro (the abandoned hotel) is packed with Search containers that count toward almost every looting challenge. On reset morning, the map is still relatively quiet.
3. Don't waste your gadgets on Wasps and Bombardiers. Save your EMP grenades for the Rocketeer and Leaper encounters late in the match, when every second lost costs you the entire run.
4. Extract early, extract often. A 12-minute raid with 60% of the target score extracted beats a 40-minute run that ends in a botched extraction at the Blue Gate. The best Cantina Legends generally chain five to six short raids per evening.
5. Check your division mid-week. The leaderboard updates roughly every six hours. Check it Thursday evening: if you're ranked 35th out of 100, one last big run on Friday can push you into the double-promotion bracket.

Verdict: Trials, the most honest loop in the extraction genre

ARC Raiders hasn't reinvented extraction, but its Trials system stands out in a market saturated with paid battle passes and aggressive FOMO. No tier locked behind a subscription, a ladder that rewards consistency over raw playtime, and a well-crafted integration with Expeditions and permanent Raider Tokens. It's up to you: the Scorta and its red Hotshot variant won't wait around past September 30. Attack the week starting Monday, keep an eye on your division, extract without misplaced ego, and this Season 5 will deliver on its promises right up to the final tier.