If you've spent any time scrolling Apex Legends lobby screens, you've definitely seen players showing off flashy, custom melee animations for their favorite legends and wondered how do you get heirlooms in Apex Legends. These ultra-rare cosmetics aren't just for show—they're a status symbol, showing you've put in the time (or sometimes a little extra cash) to grind for one of the game's most sought-after rewards. I've been playing Apex since Season 3, unlocked two heirlooms so far without spending more than $20 total on the game, so I'm breaking down exactly what works, what doesn't, and what you can skip if you're trying to get your first heirloom fast.
How Do You Get Heirlooms in Apex Legends: Core Unlock Rules First
Before we get into specific grind strategies, you need to understand the basic rules that govern all heirloom drops, because a lot of players get confused about how the system works. The 500-pack pity rule is the foundation of the entire system: every Apex pack you open, regardless of how you earn it, counts towards a hidden counter that tracks how many packs you've opened since your last heirloom drop. Even if you get nothing but common gun skins and banner frames 499 times in a row, the 500th pack is guaranteed to give you 150 heirloom shards, enough to unlock any heirloom in the store.
Your counter resets to zero the second you get any heirloom drop, whether it's a random early drop or the guaranteed pity drop. Heirloom shards also never expire, so you can hold onto them for months if you want to wait for a new legend's heirloom to drop instead of picking one you don't love right away. Every pack you earn counts directly towards your progress for how do you get heirlooms in Apex Legends, so you don't have to do anything special other than play the game to build up your counter.
Free Methods to Earn Apex Packs for Heirloom Progress
The vast majority of players who unlock heirlooms without spending money do it by slowly grinding free Apex packs across seasons. You don't have to buy a single Battle Pass to earn packs, though buying one does speed up progress a lot. The most reliable free pack sources are:
- Level up rewards: You earn one Apex pack every level from 1 to 500, with extra packs every 10 levels starting at level 10. That adds up to 199 free packs just for hitting the level cap, no extra work required. If you're a new player, you can blow through the first 100 levels in just a couple of weeks if you play a few matches a day, so that's a huge head start on your pity counter.
- Free Battle Pass tiers: Every season's free Battle Pass track gives out 6 to 8 free Apex packs for hitting tiers 1 through 110, even if you don't buy the premium pass. You just need to earn XP by playing matches, completing daily and weekly challenges, which you're probably already doing anyway.
- Limited-time event challenges: Events like the Anniversary Event, Halloween Shadow Royale, or Winter Express almost always give out free Apex packs as rewards for completing simple in-game challenges, like getting 10 kills with a shotgun or winning 3 matches as a support legend. These challenges usually give packs for far less XP than you'd need to level up, so they're worth prioritizing when events are live.
I usually set a reminder on my phone for the end date of every event, because I've missed out on free packs before by forgetting to turn in challenges before they expire. If you're short on time, focus on the challenges that give packs first, even if they're for game modes you don't usually play. A few rounds of Control or Arenas is worth it for a free pack that counts towards your heirloom.
Paid Options to Speed Up Heirloom Unlock Times
If you don't want to wait 18 to 24 months to hit that 500-pack pity mark as a free-to-play player, there are paid ways to get more packs faster, but you should be smart about how you spend your money to avoid wasting cash. The best value paid option by far is the premium Battle Pass for each season. For $10, you get 25+ Apex packs across the 110 tiers, plus 1000 Apex Coins when you hit tier 110, which is enough to buy the next season's Battle Pass for free. That means you can essentially get infinite Battle Passes for a one-time $10 purchase, as long as you finish the pass each season.
Another option is buying special collection event bundles that let you unlock a specific heirloom directly, but those bundles usually cost $160 or more, and they only pop up a few times a year during big events. I only recommend buying these if you have extra cash to burn and you want a specific heirloom right away, otherwise you're better off sticking to Battle Passes.
Buying individual Apex packs directly from the in-game store is the worst value by far. Each pack costs $1, so you'd be spending $500 to guarantee an heirloom if you bought every pack, which is way more than most people want to spend. I've only ever bought 10 individual packs in my entire time playing, and that was during a sale when they were half off, and I still didn't get an heirloom from them. It's just not worth the cost.
Common Myths About Heirloom Drops You Should Ignore
There's a ton of bad advice floating around Reddit and TikTok about how to increase your heirloom drop rate, and almost all of it is completely made up. Let's bust the most common ones so you don't waste your time trying tricks that don't work.
First, the "open packs during events" myth: A lot of people claim you have a higher chance of getting an heirloom if you open packs during a collection event, but that's not true. Heirloom drop rates are fixed at 1 in 500 packs, no matter when you open them, event or not. The only difference during events is that sometimes you can unlock a specific heirloom by collecting all event items, but that's a separate system from random heirloom drops.
Second, the "lucky pack opening order" myth: Some people say you should open common loot ticks first, then open Apex packs after to increase your luck, but there's no evidence this works. The drop for each pack is determined the second you earn it, not when you open it, so the order you open them in doesn't change a thing. I once saved up 50 packs to open during an anniversary event, and got nothing but common items, then opened a single pack I earned from a daily challenge the next day and got my second heirloom. So much for that trick.
Third, the "free heirloom glitches" myth: Any video or post claiming you can get a free heirloom with a glitch or hack is a scam. All of these either try to steal your account information, or make you download malware that can harm your device. Respawn actively bans players who use glitches to get cosmetics, so it's not worth risking your entire account for a melee skin.
At the end of the day, there's no secret shortcut when you're figuring out how do you get heirlooms in Apex Legends, but it's a lot more achievable than most new players think. If you're a free-to-play player, just focus on completing weekly and event challenges to earn as many free packs as possible, and you'll hit that pity timer before you know it. If you're willing to spend a little cash, the premium Battle Pass is the only purchase that gives you real value without breaking the bank. And don't stress if you don't get an heirloom early—they're meant to be a rare reward for long-time players, so the grind is part of the fun. I still get excited every time I open a pack, even if I know the odds are low, and that little rush of hope is part of what makes Apex so fun to play year after year.