Why is Ranked Play down in BO6 and Warzone? Season 3 Ranked Play missing, explained

When it’s time to lock in and join the squad for Ranked Play in Call of Duty, you better be ready to carry your own weight—that is if the servers for the mode aren’t down.

Unfortunately, your Ranked Play success is sometimes out of even the worst player’s hands. When Black Ops 6’s popular Ranked Play mode is offline, there’s sometimes nothing left to do but wait for it to come back. But why does it happen and what can you do about it?

Here’s everything we know about why Ranked Play is down in BO6.

Why is Ranked Play down in BO6?

On the morning of April 1, Ranked Play is down because season two is changing over to season three. The new season of CoD will go live around 11am CT, at which point Ranked Play will come back online soon after. Treyarch confirmed that Ranked Play will be unavailable from 2am CT on April 1 until after season three is live.

Ranked Play in CoD can go offline for a number of reasons, but it often is taken offline in anticipation of the deployment of a new update for BO6. It also happens in the morning of the day a new season begins, and this kind of change usually affects Warzone as well.

Ranked Play goes offline on the day of a new season launch to prepare for a reset of the ranked leaderboard for the new season, as well as a chance for the game’s new update to be loaded onto the servers. Each new season in Ranked, Skill Rating is set back a little bit, too, so players have something to grind for in the new season. Here’s how Activision explained it:

• Gold or Platinum players will start the next season in Tier 1 of Gold or Platinum, respectively.
• Diamond and above players will start the next Season at Diamond I.
• Bronze or Silver Ranked players are not impacted.

Outside of seasonal updates, Ranked Play is usually pretty consistently online. But sometimes, if there are issues with the game’s servers, it may be unavailable to play all the same, and you’ll be stuck in the same situation.

If Ranked Play is offline outside of a new season’s release date, you can follow @CODUpdates or @Treyarch on Twitter/X to stay up to date on any issues with the game, or check BO6’s server status to see if the game is having connectivity problems that have caused Ranked Play to be unavailable to play.

When is BO6 Ranked Play coming back?

When Ranked Play is offline on the day of a new season launch, don’t panic. It will be back soon, sometime after the new season goes live. New seasons in BO6 usually go live around 11am or noon CT, so the Ranked Play playlist should be back shortly after that in the afternoon following the update’s deployment.

Treyarch also revealed that “competitors that are returning after an extended period of inactivity may need to win 10 Matches to requalify for Ranked Play in Season Three,” so be prepared to grind a bit if you can’t log in to play Ranked straight away.

Keep this information in mind every time a season ends and a new season is about to begin. Sometimes, the mode is taken down the night before an update, and other times, it’s taken down in the very early morning hours on the day of the update.

If you’re grinding Skill Rating down to the wire in any given season of BO6, always make sure to get all of your gaming in at least a day or two before the season is about to end if you can help it. We know time is money, and sometimes you may have no chance to play before then, but the good thing is that a new season is right around the corner, and the grind can begin anew all over again.

If Ranked Play is offline because of widespread server issues, it may take a bit longer than expected. As mentioned above, follow CoD accounts on social media for the latest information on what’s going on with BO6, and keep it locked on Dot Esports for all of the latest CoD news.

This article will be updated with more information if necessary.